[Digikam-users] Image file alterations

[Gilles Caulier]

2009/1/13 Chris Savery <chrissavery at gmail.com>

>  Hello,
> I'm new to digiKam. I am currently using Lightroom on WinXP under
> VirtualBox. I would very much like to move to using digiKam so that I can do
> my photo work under linux.
>
> First thing that comes to mind when trying this out:
>
> -> if I add my image file tree being used under Lightroom into digiKam as
> albums is digiKam going to write back to the image metadata on those images?
>

By default no. There is a set of options in digiKam Metadata panel to
configure this behaviour

http://www.flickr.com/photos/digikam/3037188459/sizes/o/


>
>
> I'd rather that all my Canon CR2 images remained intact and unaltered.
>

This wil be the case. Not that digiKam use Exiv2 library to play with image
metadata (reading and writting)




> I would also very much like if they can co-habitate in both Lightroom and
> digiKam until I have decided that digiKam offers enough incentive to drop
> Lightroom. I have looked through the manual but can't find a clear answer on
> this.
>
> Second thing that I'm not clear on is when adding images from my CF cards
> using the auto-album mode to create date folders is what those 3 date
> options really mean. It isn't stated anywhere that I can find, but maybe I'm
> not looking enough. I want to use the same format I do now - eg.
> 2009/January/03 for the folder name. Is that "full text" or ISO. It would
> really help if that selector box there gave examples of what the options
> mean. I guess that should be added to some wish list.
>

I remember something like that in bugzilla. People want to have the best
flexibility about file renaming. Look here :

http://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=141240
http://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=144227
http://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=166060


>
>
> Lastly, in digiKam it looks like there is no similar concept to the
> "catalog" of Lightroom. As far as I can tell when images are added to an
> album it is simply a way of managing a file folder tree.
>

not only. digiKam support virtual album (Tags, Search, etc...)


> So if that's the case I'm not clear how one works with offline content
> stored on removable media. If the albums are "out there" (not online) is the
> data still stored in the database.
>

With KDE4 version, yes.



> So is there only ONE really big database for everything ever touched in
> digiKam or is there some way to select a current database, ie. catalog?
>

There is one big database file for all collections.


>
> I have many years background programming for Win32 GUI in C/C++. If I am
> able to really use digiKam for my photography under Linux then I'd be really
> happy to contribute through programming for digiKam too. There would be a
> learning curve for me as I have not yet coded for Linux Gui (just console
> apps so far).
>

You is welcome to join team. digiKam is just ported to Windows, and
testers/developers are welcome to hack this version. digiKam is a Linux
application originaly, based on Qt4 toolkit. it compile and run under Unix,
Win32 and MacosX in native.

The first pointer to start to help is this page :

http://www.digikam.org/contrib

Thanks for your help

Gilles Caulier
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