[Digikam-users] Question about file date / EXIF date

[Robert Latest]

Hello all,

I'm confused about the following: I like to view my photos in
chronological order they were taken. Hoever, it seems that digikam
orders the photos by file modification date. This leads to the
unfortunate situation that whenever I edit the metadata of a picture,
it jumps to the bottom of the view.

People who use only one camera probably don't notice this because their
camera simply names the files by ascending numbers, but I and my family
have several cameras in use. I use a homwgrown importing tool which,
after copying the image file to its assigned place, changes the file's
mtime timestamp to the actual EXIF date of the image contained in the
file.

What I don't understand is this:

1. Why doesn't digikam offer the option to sort by EXIF date rather
than just "date" (which seems to be the file's mtime)?

2. Why is the image file touched at all when in "Configure > Metadata"
none of the options under "Reading and Writing Metadata" is activated?

3. What does the "Update the file timestamp when files are modified"
do? It seems that this would be exactly the option I need; however, it
doesn't make a difference whether I activate it or not. The file
timestamp is always updated.

Thanks for a great piece of software!
robert