Is there such a thing as a virtual copy?

[neal]

Sorry if my subject line does not convey my question properly.
I have many images which belong in multiple folders (my DB is folder-based). For example: a surgery image in SURGERY FOLDER and the same image in CARDIAC SURGERY FOLDER. Without creating a copy which takes up a lot of space, is there a way to make a "virtual copy"?
Neal

[neal]

I know that using categories could do this, but I prefer to use only folders if possible.

[ubacher]

Having files in different folders like you describe is common when people do not have a good
management system. In Imatch you would keep one image (most often in folders organized by date)
and then you would assign categories to it - in your case probably a category tree SURGERY with subcategories SUGERY|Cardiac
SURGERY|Liver ....

You could then also add categories indicating the Gender of the patient, an age group etc.

[Mario]

For example: a surgery image in SURGERY FOLDER and the same image in CARDIAC SURGERY FOLDER.

This is a very common use case for IMatch Categories.
You can organize your images into any number of hierarchical categories, creating any number of virtual copies of the image without duplicating the file on your hard disk.

I know that using categories could do this, but I prefer to use only folders if possible.

How should that work?
You cannot have the same file twice (with the same name) in a folder.

And duplicating files into a SURGERY and CARDIAC SURGERY folders would be a mistake - because the file now exists twice and you would have to keep all changes you make to the file manually synchronized - from editing to metadata. This would be a very bad idea.

DAM uses categories or similar concepts for good reasons. And to avoid duplicating files and all the metadata mess that comes from that.
Thousands of IMatch users organize their files using categories, hierarchical keywords, or both. Don't work against the system. Use the tools designed to handle exactly this use case.