Hierarchical Keywords & Synonyms

[garypcook]

Hi,

I'm just starting to explore IMatch5 (long time user of v3) and am having a problem with keywords :-

I have defined a small test hierarchy of keywords in the thesaurus with synonyms at various levels of the hierarchy but when I add a keyword at the bottom of the hierarchy only it's synonyms get added - synonyms of keywords higher up the hierarchy don't get added for some reason.

For example my hierarchy may be :-

UK
    {United Kingdom}
    {Great Britain}
    England
       Northumberland
          {Northumbria}

If I then add the keyword Northumberland this appears as a hierarchical keyword UK|England|Northumberland and UK|England|Northumbria is automatically added and these are mapped to flat keywords UK;England;Northumberland;Northumbria but the synonyms United Kingdom and Great Britain are not added.

Am I doing something wrong?

I have the following options selected in the Metadata preferences :-

Write hierarchical keywords
Write path elements
Don't replace existing hierarchical keywords
Lookup keywords via thesaurus
Also assign synonyms

Many thanks,

Gary

[Mario]

I add a keyword at the bottom of the hierarchy only it's synonyms get added - synonyms of keywords higher up the hierarchy don't get added for some reason.

When you add a keyword, it's synonyms are added as well. But you add only one keyword. IMatch does not automatically add all parent keywords of the keyword you add to your file, or their synonyms.

If I then add the keyword Northumberland this appears as a hierarchical keyword UK|England|Northumberland and UK|England|Northumbria is automatically added and these are mapped to flat keywords UK;England;Northumberland;Northumbria but the synonyms United Kingdom and Great Britain are not added.

This behavior is by design. You add one keyword "UK|England|Northumberland" to your file. IMatch automatically adds the synonym for that keyword as well. The file then contains the two hierarchical keywords:

UK|England|Northumberland;
UK|England|Northumbria


When IMatch flattens these two keywords into the XMP:subject tag, it works only with the two keywords actually assigned to the file. It does not look at keywords higher in the hierarchy in the thesaurus or anything.

[garypcook]

Hi Mario,

Maybe I've misunderstood the purpose of hierarchical keywords? I thought the whole point of these was that you did not need to add all the parent keywords as well as the lead keyword? ie. England and UK are automatically added, saving me the time and effort of adding these separately so that if someone searches for UK for example this image would be found.

If I need to add England and UK as separate keywords in order to make sure that these and all their synonyms are added what is the point of a hierarchical structure? I may as well just add flat keywords.

Is there any way around this or can it be added as a optional feature?

Regards,

Gary

[Mario]

This is a different way to see it.
Hierarchical keywords are mostly for ordering things, bringing keywords in to a hierarchy for easier lookup.  For example,

Location|Country|UK or Motive|Plants|Rose.

But what you are talking about is more how IMatch flattens a hierarchical keyword.

If you set the option Write path elements under Edit Preferences > Metadata IMatch breaks the hierarchical keywords

Code Select Expand

UK|England|Northumberland
UK|England|Northumbria

into their individual path elements

Northumberland;
Northumbria;
England;
UK

[garypcook]

Hi Mario,

I do have Write path elements selected - but I believe it would be much more useful if it also added the synonyms of the higher level keywords at the same time.

Regards,

Gary

[Mario]

If you want such an option, please add a request in the Feature Request Board. Other users can see and discuss and vote for it.