IMatch 5.2.10

[Richard]

As usual download and update went as smooth as silk. I had already read the Release Notes when I opened the new version for the first time. I really liked the dialog box about Tag Manager that popped up. I don't recall seeing something like that before. I also think that the new Tag Manager is one of the best moves you have made. Since you have made many great moves, that says a lot about my opinion of Tag Manager.

[sinus]

As usual download and update went as smooth as silk. I had already read the Release Notes when I opened the new version for the first time. I really liked the dialog box about Tag Manager that popped up. I don't recall seeing something like that before. I also think that the new Tag Manager is one of the best moves you have made. Since you have made many great moves, that says a lot about my opinion of Tag Manager.

Thanks, Richard, gives me a good feeling ... because I am currently to backup my DB (10 GB) and pack'n'go and what I can do before I update (better once more backup than only 1) .

Tag Manager makes me curious. As long as I can have the RAW-Data from Lightroom and Photoshop, for me is this for sure a good step. When I scroll through the entries, what only a raw-file (nef) has, this is simply overhelming - and mostly not necessary.

Say only the time of a file, I mean 1/30 second or 1/125.
In the analog time, if you have ended with a slide or negative, usually (with exceptions) it was really not that interesting, that you would write this down (usually). Or the distance to the object and so on.

But nowadays all jingle and bells are already in the file. And, ok, IF we have it, it is nice to have and nice to play.
That I can imagine, that this was a clever step from Mario.

[Mario]

(...) I really liked the dialog box about Tag Manager that popped up. I don't recall seeing something like that before.(...)

I used such a dialog the first time for the 5.2.8 release, to inform users about the new Face Annotation feature. Since the Tag Manager is so important, I've added a dialog this time too.

If a user updates from 5.2.6 he will see two (!) dialogs, so we cannot do this too often. Not all users keep up with updates, and sometimes they work with versions several months out of date. Despite Facebook, Twitter, the Announcement board here, the automatic update check built into IMatch and whatnot... 

There are even users out there who still work with IMatch 3.4 - and happily so. And that version is almost 10 years old.

And yes, I hope that the Tag Manager and that IMatch now by default just ignores most of the metadata fluff nobody needs will speed things up. Especially for users who have databases with 200,000 RAW files... 200,000 x ~ 400 tags per file = 80 million (!) records. Bring that down to 30 million and thinks will be considerably faster.

[Richard]

I used such a dialog the first time for the 5.2.8 release, to inform users about the new Face Annotation feature.

I am getting forgetful as I age. 

There are even users out there who still work with IMatch 3.4 - and happily so

I check the old forum about four times a day and I am often impressed by how many folks are using it. As many as 25 at the time I am checking. Almost no posts but always someone checking what is there. And why not? IMatch 3.4 was a rock solid application with tremendous features and they may not need things added in 3.5 and 3.6. They certainly have gotten their money's worth out of it. 

[BanjoTom]

My applause and kudos also, Mario, for the new Tag Manager in 5.2.10.  My database is already a bit smaller after clearing out the unused tags with Database Diagnostics and then Compress/Optimize.  This will surely improve performance of IMatch throughout!   

[Gerd]

Mario,

thanks! Great!

[DigPeter]

5.2.10 installed with no trouble.  First result with Tag Manager on a small 59MB database resulted in 28% reduction in size.

[Lord_Helmchen]

Tag Manager looks good. My DB shrunk from about 7GB to 5.5GB - even with additionally selected Canon Maker Notes.

[Mario]

Tag Manager looks good. My DB shrunk from about 7GB to 5.5GB - even with additionally selected Canon Maker Notes.

Very good. But even more than the reduce in disk space usage (which is just a side-effect) the real improvement is the much smaller amount of tag data to process.

If you still have the diagnosis log file (im5diag.txt in the TEMP folder on your system), please open it in Notepad and search the text

rows removed

to find how many rows IMatch could remove. That would be interesting to know.

[joel23]

If you still have the diagnosis log file (im5diag.txt in the TEMP folder on your system), please open it in Notepad and search the text

rows removed
to find how many rows IMatch could remove. That would be interesting to know.

25516 files
Completed in 47s. 3214618 rows removed.
400MB saved.
Default settings

[Mario]

3 million rows saved for as little as 25,000 files. That's good.

Consider the savings for users with 100,000 or 200,000 files. Should speed many things up a bit for them.

[joel23]

3 million rows saved for as little as 25,000 files. That's good.

Consider the savings for users with 100,000 or 200,000 files. Should speed many things up a bit for them.

With this little files I can't tell about speed, but yes, it seems to be a pretty neat feature.
Thanks for that!

[Lord_Helmchen]

Tag Manager looks good. My DB shrunk from about 7GB to 5.5GB - even with additionally selected Canon Maker Notes.

Very good. But even more than the reduce in disk space usage (which is just a side-effect) the real improvement is the much smaller amount of tag data to process.

If you still have the diagnosis log file (im5diag.txt in the TEMP folder on your system), please open it in Notepad and search the text

rows removed

to find how many rows IMatch could remove. That would be interesting to know.

Sorry, I don't have the file anymore. And to be honest, I'm not really sure, if not some more guidance about which groups are not relevant or have redundant data would be helpful for non Meta Data geeks.

And what happens, if I use a new cam model which stores some interesting date which might be helpful. Will I get an info like "New Meta Data group found - should it be imported?".

Just my current thoughts.

[Mario]

Tags are added, changed and removed in ExifTool from time to time. I don't attempt to keep track of this. New groups are rarely added, maybe when a new series of cameras is released. But that's only proprietary maker notes.  Phil does also not document all groups or tags in detail, because many groups are only for one or two camera models (often they have numbers) or just one specific software.

IMatch by default imports all EXIF, legacy IPTC, XMP IPTC, IPTC Core, XMP, GPS, PDF, Video and Audio data etc. It only skips a whole lot of maker notes now.

Using the defaults, IMatch shows you much more metadata already than you see Lightroom or other RAW or DAM software. If you need more data on top of that, only you can know which data this is. And now you can selectively include data only you are interested it using the Tag Manager.

IMatch currently knows about 18,000 metadata fields. Some tags are only for one specific camera model, or even one specific firmware version. I cannot say how many or which groups or tags are of interest for you, or which are filled for which camera model or firmware version. I just give you the tools.

If you are in doubt, open the Tag Manager, select all groups which sound remotely interesting. Then reload the metadata for one of your files with <Shift>+<Ctrl>+<F5>. Switch the Metadata Panel to Browser mode and check what has been imported. Then keep your selection, or remove groups and tags you don't want.