[Digikam-users] Confused about meta-data templates

[Peter Albrecht]

Hi Mark, Guy,

I use templates to assign copyright and contact information
only. Those are quite static and identical to most images.

Saving the place, where the picture was taken, I use tags.
Those are quite more flexible.

Kind regards,
	Peter

On 03.03.2012 23:59, Guy Stalnaker wrote:
> Mark,
> 
> Thank you for the pointer on how one actually *applies* a
> template one has created. You were more persistent than I
> was -- I gave up after two days trying to figure it out.
> 
> Guy
> 
> On 02/27/2012 08:40 AM, Mark Hayes (Hotmail) wrote:
>> Hi all,
>>
>> I'm experimenting with Digikam's meta-data templates as a
>> way of
>> inputting a lot of metadata early on in my workflow.  I've
>> not played
>> with it before, but the whole idea seems fairly intuitive
>> so I presumed
>> that I would be able to sort it out fairly easily. 
>> Nevertheless, I'm
>> struggling with it - quite a lot really, so wanted to quiz
>> people on how
>> they used templates.
>>
>> Firstly, I usually import pictures with Rapid Photo
>> Downloader.  I find
>> it fast, excellent, easy to use, and able to rename and
>> sort according
>> to my preferences on import, along with making a
>> simultaneous backup.
>> For some reason, I have struggled to do the same with
>> Digikam, in
>> particular using the regex renamer - which must make
>> perfect sense to
>> coders, but is complete gobbledegook to myself.  The regex
>> renamer seems
>> to struggle to remove parts of a filename for me - even
>> when I follow
>> the very simple instructions on the Digikam blog etc.  Ho
>> hum...
>>
>> I hit on a bunch of problems - so I'll try and break them
>> down a little
>> to make it more manageable.  Any help you can give on any
>> of these items
>> is most welcome.
>>
>> Firstly, setting up a template.  From a UI point of view,
>> I struggled
>> initially.  The 'Add' button didn't seem to open up a
>> dialogue box to
>> fill in data - which is what I had expected it to do.  You
>> had to fill
>> out the data, including a name for the template, before
>> pressing Add to
>> add it into the list of available templates.  This seems a
>> little
>> counter-intuitive to me (anyone else too?) and although I
>> eventually
>> worked it out, being a little quirky just seemed to make
>> it a little
>> more of an effort.
>>
>> In addition, I had imagined that a template would be a
>> generally minimum
>> set of basic "boilerplate" info that you then added to -
>> but how to add
>> the additional information seems harder than it should
>> be.  I had
>> thought that you would leave a bunch of fields blank -
>> such as location
>> and then update them later, when applying the template to
>> the photos.
>> But when I came to update/apply the template later, I hit
>> on other
>> problems related to that.
>>
>> Anyway, the Digikam manual/help-file states that templates
>> can be
>> applied at downloading.  Since I don't use Digikam to
>> download, this
>> means that I need to apply the template later.  It took me
>> a while to
>> find out how.  I had tried selecting photos and then
>> editing metadata
>> but this doesn't seem to be the right way.  I also looked
>> long and hard
>> at the metadata tab on the right hand panel.  In the end,
>> I had to
>> Google it and then surf to the Scribbles and Snaps blog to
>> find out how
>> to apply it.  Apparently, metadata templates are applied
>> under
>> "Captions/Tags" panel and then choosing the "Information"
>> tab on the
>> right hand panel.
>>
>> I realise that Digikam is a hugely complicated program
>> with a lot to it
>> - but I really am struggling to understand why template
>> application
>> would appear there - and not in and around the metadata
>> tab.  Is there a
>> reason behind that?  What is the main notional separation
>> between photo
>> metadata and my/your metadata templates that is being
>> applied here?  Why
>> would they seem so far apart and stuck in such very
>> different locations?
>>
>> Anyway, so now I found it - but then I came across another
>> problem.
>> When applying a template, you are not able to adjust any
>> data before
>> application.  I would have assumed that I could select
>> pictures, select
>> a template to base my data on, and then make any
>> adjustments necessary
>> (such as a change of location and country, subject matter
>> etc etc) and
>> then apply the template with the adjusted data.  But I
>> don't seem to be
>> able to do that.  I am not able to change any data or add
>> any more data
>> to the basic template before application.  And now that I
>> have 362
>> images with the wrong country data (picked up from the
>> template), I am
>> unsure as to how I can update/change that.
>>
>> I must be pressing all the wrong buttons because I can't
>> seem to do
>> that.  Please let me know:  what am I doing wrong?
>>
>> Finally, I am now trying to adjust the 'country' metadata
>> that I have
>> now incorrectly embedded in the files.  I have a bunch of
>> photos showing
>> that they were took in one country, when in fact they were
>> taken
>> elsewhere on holiday.  So I select all the files again,
>> choose Image>
>> Metadata>  Edit all metadata and I'm presented with a
>> pop-up box with
>> loads of metadata options.  The interesting thing about
>> this dialog is
>> that it seems to be for changing only one file at a time -
>> starting with
>> file number 1 of 362 in this folder, and not a 'template'
>> system that
>> allows me to change all of the files en-masse.
>>
>> Anyway, with my first file being a CR2, I'm not able to
>> edit the
>> metadata.  I'm able to choose from the three tabs across
>> the top - Edit
>> EXIF, Edit IPTC or Edit XMP - but not able to choose any
>> of the tabs
>> down the left hand side of that box to edit them.  Fair
>> enough, given
>> that it's a CR2 file, but then if I click on 'Next' to go
>> to the JPG
>> version of the same file (in the hopes of changing that
>> metadata), the
>> system hangs and I am not able to advance to the second
>> picture.  I am
>> unable to Close the box, either by clicking on Close or on
>> the X at the
>> top of the window...  Dialogue buttons show no reaction to
>> clicking, but
>> clicking on the X seems to bring up a KWin warning about
>> non response
>> and asking me if I want to terminate the application and
>> its child
>> windows with the loss of all unsaved data.  Humph!!!
>>
>> It's very repeatable - and I've done it about 10 times
>> tonight trying to
>> find out how to get all this to work.  I'm on Kubuntu
>> 11.10 using
>> version 2.1.1 of Digikam on KDE 4.7.4
>>
>> I'm starting to get concerned that I'm pressing all the
>> wrong buttons
>> etc.  Thousands of people use Digikam without all the
>> problems that I
>> seem to get - and I have been trying on and off to use
>> Digikam for four
>> years... but still struggle to get it up and running.  I
>> give up
>> frequently but come back just as often because I know that
>> it's great
>> software that many people use effortlessly.  So what am I
>> doing wrong????!!!
>>
>> Grateful if anyone can shed some light on this for me.  It
>> really
>> shouldn't seem this hard for me - and yet, honestly (!!
>> :-) ) I am not
>> _that_ stupid all of the time...!
>>
>> Thanks,
>>
>> Mark.
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