Guided error handling in combination with exif tool

[ChrisMatch]

Hi

The situation:
While indexing my archiv of images I observe that some files produce an error while iMatch/exiftool is performing the metadata writeback.

The problem:
Those files disappear from the 'pending metadata writeback collection' and you only get an idea of what has happend if you have opened the Output panel.
Even then the Output Panel is full of information a normal use can't interpret.

Warning: Bad IFD1 Directory
Error: Bad format (0) for IFD0 entry 10
Warning: Error converting value for ExifIFD:SubSecTimeOriginal (ValueConvInv)

But what does this all mean?
Have the metadata been written to the file or not?
Are the files in a state that I would expect or is there an action needed from my side?

Yes, metadata are a mess and those problems are not iMatch/Marios fault.


The suggestion:
After eliminating all the more important problems
I think the users would benefit from a more 'guided process'.

The warnings and errors exiftool generates
- should be categorized
- and the user should get a more user-friendly information about what happend and what the user should do now

I'm thinking of informations like...
*) Your metadata have been written to the files. There have been some warnings that don't relate to the written metadata.
*) Only some of the metadata could be written to the files. Element XY is malformed and needs to be repaired. You can find the corresponding files here ABC. Information about how to repair the element can be found here WWW.


It would also help to find the files with errors and warnings later on
if we could get a collection with 'exiftool warnings' and 'exiftool errors'.

thanks
chris

[attachment deleted by admin]

[Mario]

ExifTool error messages are all plain text, may come in multiple languages (?), may change between each version of ExifTool. There is no "number" or anything I could reliably link to.

Usually, when ExifTool fails to write to a file, IMatch sets the yellow warning icon and imports the error message into the Extra\ErrorInfo tag. This tag is also (usually) filled by ExifTool when there are problems while importing a file.

Please send me one of the files you used for this test (before the write-back). I can check why the normal error handling does not work.

But basically: Damaged metadata encountered in a file may or may not prevent ExifTool from writing the file. Did you check with the ECP if the file contains the changes you have made?

The warnings and errors issued by ExifTool (and warnings we can usually ignore so it's only messages which somewhere contain "Error". Unfortunately Phil did not use unique codes (and it's too late to change that now without a massive amount of work for him) so it's impossible to tell if an Error reported prevented ExifTool from updating all data, partial data or caused no effect whatsoever. But errors are rare and usually indicate a more or less severe problem with the file. You can always search for he error message in the ExifTool Forum to get some hints about under which conditions the error is reported and how to fix the file.

[jch2103]

Chris - See also https://www.photools.com/community/index.php?topic=2659.msg17249#msg17249

As Mario points out, you can search for files with the Extra\ErrorInfo tag to find problem files. You may also want to take a look at the ExifTool FAQ, especially #20 for repair options: http://owl.phy.queensu.ca/~phil/exiftool/faq.html#Q20

Finding problems with bad metadata isn't unusual when you start using IMatch, because it's so much more thorough about handling metadata than most image processing programs. Too many programs, especially in the past, weren't very careful with metadata (if they even knew what it was), in addition to assorted hardware-related issues (power spikes, hard disk errors, etc.). Fortunately, once you've gotten things cleaned up it should be pretty smooth sailing afterwards. 

[ChrisMatch]

First of all: thanks for your replies - much appreciated.

Let me start with a general statement:
I have a computer and IT background and I am willing to invest time into this metadata thing
(even if I would like to use more of this time to take photos).

The reason for this feature request was that I thought others may get frustrated.
It is one thing to decide you want your metadata to travel with your images (not only keep them in the iMatch database)
but it's another thing to deal with all the problems that occur afterwards.

So I thought there should be more help from the programm for the average user out there.
This would help people to help themselves - otherwise we have to deal with those problems on an individual basis - case by case.

@Mario
Interaction with the ExifTool
I understand that the interactions with ExifTool is limited. No 'error numbers' and no clear information about whether the metadata was written (partly) or not doesn't leave us with many options how to support the users. :-(


Finding the erroneous files
At the moment I am struggeling with finding the corresponding files.
Yes, I can see the warning icon but the problem is that the files disappear from the "pending metadata writeback collection".

So I followed your advice and created a data-driven category for the 'Extra/Error'-tag
(side note: I did NOT find a tag named "ErrorInfo" but I assume you meant 'Error' (Extra\Error\Error\0) !?).
This only shows 5 files that surely are not all of them (maybe I did something wrong with my definition of the data-driven category?).

Remark: maybe it would be a nice thing to ship iMatch already with such a data-driven category

I am not sure if this means that iMatch/exiftool failed to write this information
(maybe because metadata writeback didn't work at all?)
-> if yes, iMatch should at least ensure that this information is written into the iMatch database!?


Sample Files
I am not sure how I can identify those files "befor the write-back" in the first place?
(I will try to find some by chance and send them to you)

Are those image files broken?
At least it seems that those files are not heavily damaged -> iMatch itself and other image viewers have no problem displaying those files.


@jch2103
Thanks for your link to the repair options.
If such errors occur -> iMatch could show a dialog with a direct link to a help section where
the user gets an overview about the whole situation (including important additional informations like links to the exiftool repair options).


Attachements
I attached as screenshot showing the result of my data-driven category (Error) and its definition.

[attachment deleted by admin]