Alphabetic Categories & Category view

[Maximan]

Hi Folks,

I'm fairly new to iMatch 5 and I'm still trying to get my head around some of it's nuances. I use multiple monitors and being able to have each panel where I want it is fantastic.

On to my questions, please could someone advise if there is anyway to change the sorting of Categories list so that it doesn't always resort to listing them alphabetically?
I suppose I could number each sibling & child but just being able to drag & drop them in the order I want (and have iMatch 5 remember that order next time the program loads) would be perfect!

Also is there a way to have the category list (mine's a long one!) in columns so you don't have to keep scrolling down?

Thanks in advance,

Max

[Richard]

Configuring Categories The Gear icon in the Category View toolbar gives you access to some properties which control the look and behavior of the category tree:

Property

Description

Sort Mode

Allows you to select different ways to sort the category tree. Usually the default sort mode works best for most scenarios. The custom sort mode allows you to manually reorder the categories in the tree using the mouse and drag and drop. If enabled, you can move categories by holding down the Alt key and dragging them to their new position. You can only move categories on the same level (among the siblings of the same parent).

[Mario]

As Richard pointed out, you can change the category sort order via the options available when you click on the Gear icon.

Categories are hierarchical by design and thus the best way to present them is a hierarchical tree. If your categories are basically long lists of words, you may re-consider your approach and introduce some additional levels (parent->child relationships). This allows you to organize even massively large lists of categories (e.g. scientific taxonomies) into manageable sections.

The @Keyword category hierarchy, which represents the keywords in your files, is usually the 'longest list of words'. Since this is a data-driven category you an use the 'Add Auto-Group' option to group your keywords by their first n characters.

[thrinn]

In addition to what has been explained already: The category panel also offers the option to add up to 6 category tabs to show different parts of your category tree. Not exactly the column view you were asking for, but coming near. See The Categories Panel in the help.

[Mario]

Very good.

And there are the 'find' and 'filter' functions in the Category View, which allow you to quickly find specific categories, or to limit the categories displayed to categories with names matching a given expression.

[Maximan]

Thank you very much for all your advice, you've all been very helpful