See Pending updates

[HansEverts]

It would be useful to be able to see the pending updates.

It regularly happens that the pop up tells me that All background thasks were completed and yet, immediately after it starts again updating
For example, I create a keyword in the category view, but it takes ages before it appears in the keyword panel or in the thesaurus. In the mean time I think I did something wrong and try other options, which probably worsens the situation. If I would see that my instruction is pending, I can hope it goes faster, but at least I know it will happen.

[Mario]

Files with pending updates show the pen icon.
All files with pending updates are shown in the Pending Metadata Write-back collection.
The Info & Activity Panel will show what IMatch is doing in the background, how many entries are in the queue etc.

For example, I create a keyword in the category view, but it takes ages before it appears in the keyword panel

I've made a quick test:

I show the category panel at the top and the Keyword Panel below that. This way I can see both.
I select an image.
I assign the image to a child category of @Keywords using the Category Panel.

About one second later the keyword shows up in the Keyword panel. That's quite fast, actually.

When you assign a @Keyword category to a file, IMatch first updates the category in the database, all depending categories and collections. It then loads the metadata of the file from the database, and produces the keyword from the category. This means checking for duplicate keywords, mapping the resulting hierarchical keyword to flat keywords applying the options you have set under Edit > Preferences > Metadata etc. Finally it writes back the metadata to the database. This causes a refresh of the Keyword Panel so the new keyword set is loaded.

How long does this operation take on your machine?

[HansEverts]

Thanks Maro,

I made this more concrete in post 42 under general discussions. I have seen the pending metadata write-back under Collections.
Mine is at 3500, but going down. I guess something I did caused it to update the whole database (35 000 files). That is reassuring in that it means that in the end it will probably be alright, but I would like to understand what happened and prevent to repeat it.
Unless it exists already, it might be useful to include a table, indicating that if the user switches off Automatic write-back or Indexing, disrepancies between the view and the panel can be expected.

[Mario]

I guess something I did caused it to update the whole database (35 000 files).

Do you use Metadata Templates which are applied when files are ingested?

Do you map XMP hierarchical keywords to flat keywords? This can produce new keywords in IPTC and XMP when you ingest a file. And this will make the file pending and IMatch will write it back when you have background write-back enabled.

There are two typical reasons. I cannot tell what you have changed in the files. IMatch does not write-back files when they have not been changed.
Looking at the ExifTool output panel (make sure you enable the verbose mode under Edit > Preferences > Application) shows what IMatch is writing to the files.

disrepancies between the view and the panel can be expected.

This is mentioned and explained in several topics already. Users never read the help until absolutely required. Many users also click away popup hints and don't read the tooltips. Nothing I can do about this.