Edit photo metadata

Edit metadata such as Geo-coordinates, titles, tags, etc.

With release of version 7, PicApport becomes a comprehensive management tool for your photo collection.

The following metadata can now be changed

  • Metadata of the .jpg files (Modifies metadata of the original files)
    • Photo title
    • Description
    • Rating (Stars)
    • Keywords / Subjects
    • Persons
    • Creation date and time
    • Geo-coordinates(GPS coordinates via built in map module)
  • PicApport Extension Likes
    To like a photo simply click on the hand icon below the thumbnail

     

  • PicApport Exetension MyTags
    A user can assign multiple tags for a photo.
    A tag is always exactly one word.

 

For technical details, see: Full text search of photos – Supported metadata – PicApport Wiki (contecon.de)

Likes and MyTags

With Likes and MyTags, a user-dependent tagging system has been implemented in PicApport.
These can be queried easily via the newly introduced operators #, ##,  ++ and —.
See operators below.

Likes and MyTags are not stored in the .jpg file but in the user directory
(.picapport/users/user/[akuellerUser]/picapport.tags) of the current user.
The information does not end up in the photo file.

When uploading a photo via the web interface, a MyTag check is generated automatically.
See the upload.user.tag parameter in the PicApport-Server Guide – PicApport Wiki (contecon.de)

User permissions for managing metadata

  • Permission to edit photo metadata. (Title, description, date, etc.)
    (pap:editmeta:photo)
    Important: The permission to edit metadata (including geolocations) must be explicitly be granted with the usermanagement
    after the update to Version 7.     This also includes the administrator. This is to prevent users from unwanted changes to the metadata of a collection of photos.
    (The permissions for Likes and MyTags are handled separately because they do not alter existing metadata)
  • Permission to set geolocations (geotagging).
    (pap:editmeta:photo)
  • Permission to like a photo.
    (pap:editmeta:mytags:like)
  • Permission to manage usertags (MyTags)
    (pap:editmeta:mytags:tags)
  • Permission to view photo metadata
    (pap:access:metadata)

New operators

Operators for Likes:

  • ++ (at least one like: same result as ++1)
  • ++n[nnnn] ( >= at least n likes)
  • — (No Likes: same result as –1)
  • –n[nnnn] ( < less than  n likes)
  • ++@ (liked by me)
  • ++@userid (liked by userid)

Operators for MyTags

  • Input of one word e.g. Holiday searches in all words (Title, Description, Keyword etc.) as before (before version 7) and in MyTags (current user -> MyTags)

  • Input of #Holiday searches Holiday only in the tags of the current user (MyTags)

  • Input of ##Holiday searches in MyTags of all users

  • Input of #Holiday@userid searches in the tags of a specific user

  • Input of #+Holiday searches in all words (Title, Description, Keyword etc.) as before and in all  MyTags from all users

  • Input of #-Holiday searches in all words (Title, Description, Keyword etc.) without MyTags (as before)

Functions in the user interface of the Thumbnailview

The sidebar for managing the metadata

The sidebar is opened either via the menu tags, a long click on the hamburger-menue or the small triangle in the upper right corner of the thumbnail page..
The width of the sidebar can be comfortably changed with the bar.

Which metadata is displayed and whether you can change it is set via user permissions.

To prevent accidental overwriting of the metadata, these must be explicitly saved by pressing the blue + or diskette button.

Switchable selection mode

  • When the sidebar is open to manage the metadata, the selection mode can now be switched (right-click above or CTRL-space)
  • The new single-selection mode is useful when editing metadata
    • Always exactly one photo will be selected
    • Exceptions:
      • Range-Select with shift-click, longclick or shift + arrow-keys
      • Select via hotkeys like e.g.  CTRL+1 etc.

    • In single-selection mode, the last photo displayed in the slideshow is automatically selected and moved to the visible area
      when you navigate back from the slideshow to the thumbnails.

  • If the sidebar is closed, the multi-selection mode is automatically set

Selection filter

  • Selection filter – funnel icon in the upper right corner of the thumbnail page (CTRL+F)
    • If active, only selected thumbnails will be displayed
    • When active and a thumb is deselected the thumb will disappear
    • When the last thumb is deselected, the filter is automatically switched off
    • If additional thumbs are loaded (next button on the bottom), the filter is automatically switched off
    • When you select photos (for example, CTRL+1 or ALT+2 etc), they will automatically become visible when the filter is active

Comfort function Quickbuttons

  • For the fields MyTags, Keywords and Persons you can use „Quickbuttons“ to tag the photos with one click  (button with triangle)
    Simply click on a quickbutton with the finger or the mouse to put the tag on the selected photos.
  • There are 2 types of Quickbuttons:
    • Automatically the 10 most recent tags (dark blue, right)
    • Manually assigned (brighter blue, left)
      To create a Quickbutton simply type +[TheNewTag] in the input field above and press ENTER or + .
  • Quickbuttons can be removed by typing – (Minus) in the input field as the only character and then click on the Quickbuttons you want to delete.
    New parameter: quick.btn.max.auto (default=10)
    Number of Quickbuttons that are automatically saved

Select by Tag

  • Select by Tag (also in conjunction with active selection filter)
    • With the sidebar open you can click on the tag-buttons (MyTags, keywords and persons)
    • Simple click: Select all thumbs with this tag
    • Shift + Click or Long-tap on tablets (without mouse): Deselect all thumbs with this tag
    • CTRL + click: Select only thumbs with this tag (all others are deselected)

Menu „Tags“ if photos are selected

  • I like the selection
    „Like“ the photo. Same function as clicking on the hand-icon on the thumbnail
  • I don’t like the selection anymore
    „Dislike“ the photo. Same function as clicking on the hand-icon on the thumbnail
  • Show metadata details (CTRL + Z)
    Displays a table of all selected photos with their metadata
  • Edit metadata (CTRL + B)
    Opens or closes the sidebar for editing metadata
  • Geoencode selected photos (CTRL + G)
    Switches to map view to set coordinates for the currently selected photos.

Keyboard shortcuts for thumbnail cursor control (for desktop browsers)

  • Arrow left, right, up, down  (with Shift is Range-Select)

  • CTRL-end, CTRL-pos1

  • Space select / deselect a photo

  • When cursor has been moved to photo with arrow keys ENTER starts the slideshow with the current photo.

 

Keyboard shortcuts to select photos in Thumbnailview

  • Toggle selection filter (CTRL + F)
  • Invert selection (CTRL + i)
  • Remove selection (CTRL+ X)
  • Select all photos with GPS-coordinates  (CTRL+ C)
  • Select all photos without a star (CTRL+ 0)
  • All with one star  (CTRL+ 1)
  • All with two stars (CTRL+ 2)
  • All with three stars (CTRL+ 3)
  • All with four stars (CTRL+ 4)
  • All with five one stars (CTRL+ 5)
  • Select all photos without likes (ALT+0)
  • Select all photos with at least one like (ALT+1)
  • Select all photos with at least two likes (ALT+2)
    and so on until at least nine likes (ALT+9)

Hierarchical keywords / Tags

With the release of version 9 PicApport also supports hierarchical keywords (synonym: keywords, subjects, tags..).

Many photo programs, such as Lightroom or the Microsoft Photo Gallery, allow you to manage keywords using tree structures. This tree structure remains in PicApport for query and can also be maintained in this way.

Prior to version 9, all keywords of the photos were broken down into their „parts“ for searching.
So from the keyword: animals/fish/sharks the three words animals, fish, sharks were offered for search.
Of course this still works. But in addition, the hierarchical structure for the search is still preserved.
The following search is now possible in version 9: keywords: „animals/fish/*“.

The following characters can be used synonymously as separators:

  • / (slash)
  • \ (backslash)
  • | (senkrechter Strich)

Hierarchical keywords are supported for both people and keywords (MyTags are not hierarchical)

Background information about hierarchical keywords

Many programs use hierarchical tree structures for keywording. The data itself is stored as word lists in the jpg files. The following is a small example of a photo that has received two (or even six – depending on your point of view) keywords via a tree structure:

  • Animals
    • Fish
      • Sharks
  • Oceans
    • Atlantic Ocean
      • South Africa

Typically (there is not really a standard) these keywords are stored as word lists separated by semicolon in the jpg file.

  • Animals/Fish/Sharks;Oceans/Atlantic Ocean/South Africa; possibly further keywords…

These word lists are broken down by PicApport as follows into individual, independent words and offered for search:

  • animals
  • fish
  • sharks
  • oceans
  • atlantic
  • ocean
  • south
  • africa
  • animals|fish|sharks
    (is considered as one word including spaces via keyword search)
  • oceans|atlantic ocean|south africa
    (is considered as one word including spaces via keyword search)

The words marked in blue above can be queried both via the global full-text search without operator and via the keywords operator. The green ones can only be queried using the keywords operator. Due to the wildcard search for keywords available in PicApport, very complex keyword queries are now possible.

The Keyword Browser (to query hierarchical keywords)

  (click to enlarge)

The keyword browser can be used to query keywords, persons and MyTags. A long click with the mouse or finger opens a context menu with further options such as the possibility to start queries for the currently selected element.

The autocomplete fields to create hierarchical keywords.

(click to enlarge)

To create keywords quickly and efficiently, there is an autocomplete function for the fields MyTags, Keywords and Persons

Simply enter the first letter of the keyword in these fields and a list of suggestions will appear. If you don’t know the first letter of the keyword, entering * will create a list of all root elements of the keywords (for persons and keywords you can also use the path separator slash or backslash instead of *)

As soon as you click on an element from the list, it is taken over into the input and you can continue typing. The Enter key or the Plus symbol then sets the currently selected (and possibly added) keyword for all selected thumbnails.