[Digikam-users] Thank you!

[Guy Stalnaker]

Realizing that the list likely gets a bit more WTF than not, I want to 
tell the Digikam devs what an incredibly great application it is.

Here's the scenario -- a new computer purchase resulted in data backup. 
But data restore went awry and ALL images were lost. Yes, Yes, I know. 
But once the milk is spilt. So, data recovery to the rescue. But UGH! 
The tools out there are damned impressive. They find a BAZILLION copies 
of things (way too many -- think cached images from browsers, and system 
thumbnails, etc.!). And number each file with a sequential numeric 
string. Again, UGH!

So, I have my library back, but I have incorrect names which are in no 
way organized AND I have LOTS of duplicates. LOOOOTS. As many as six of 
some images and I have data going back eight years. <sigh>

Two tools furthered the rescue effort. I use Linux, of course, and one 
tool is a commandline script that reads EXIF create-date data and uses 
*nix magic to create a directory structure and filename from that EXIF 
data. So, now all my files are organized by YYYY/MM/DD with names like 
DSCN_YYYYDDMMTHHMMSS.ext, etc. Which is a helluva lot better than the 
old YYYY-MM-DD/DSCN_SEQUENTIAL_CAMERA_NUMBER.EXT I had before. I will 
continue to use this script for it works with jpg, png, NEF, and NRW 
files and I like this organizational scheme quite a lot.

But what to do about the dupes?

Digikam!

Update the fingerprints for all images and search for dupes. Now, I know 
it's going to take me well over a week to wade through them all because 
there are so many (and I do wish there was a Delete/Trash icon I could 
drag selected images to rather than having to right-click, scroll to 
Move to Trash to get rid of them--but that's just a quibble). But -- 
there they are all nice and orderly in the Dupes list. Just scroll down 
and select/delete and dupes are taken care of. Brilliant!

What a tremendous resource!!

Many, many thanks.

Best regards,

GuyS


-- 
"There is only love, and then oblivion. Love is all we have
to set against hatred." (paraphrased) Ian McEwan

Guy Stalnaker
jimmyg521 at gmail.com