gmane.comp.kde.digikam.user

Feature request.

Porn Virus — 2012-05-21T05:48:11

Hello, and thanks very much for the DigiKam/ShowFoto application. I use
it a lot, and occasionally use GIMP. This is an independent
outside-origin email for the developers; I'm not a member of the DigiKam
users homepage and have not mentioned this matter inside the relevant
forums.

Just a quick request for a couple of additional features:

Since many computer users have a dual monitor setup, it would be nice to
have another Composition Guide within the Aspect Ratio Crop function.
When I edit a given image for use as a dual-screen desktop picture, it's
visually relevant to crop and divide the image, such that the physical
split between two monitors isn't too distracting. To aid in such
"crop-composition", a simple horizontal and vertical cross formation
would be very useful into the Geometric form set of choices. The
diagonals, triangles, and divisions-into-thirds are of no help, when
dividing an image into exactly half. This would save some time when
adjusting the final desktop image to look the best, when physically
divided by two screens.

Additionally, to have an "Instant Desktop" preview button somewhere
within the options, would make it easy to test-view the final edit of
the given desktop background picture.

There may not be much demand for such options, but they would aid in
editing a dual-screen desktop image. If any DigiKam/ShowFoto developers
use two (or more) monitors, they could try editing an image and see for
themselves how much quicker it may be, without using the separate "Set
as Desktop Background" function within the standard image viewer. Would
there be a way to add a "Desktop Background" function within DigiKam?

Thanks very much for the application so far. It's improved over time and
is easier to use than GIMP, but could use a couple of extra features.
I've used your application intensively for years, am quite familiar with
its major functions, and am very happy with it.

- Grateful user.

PS - I've noticed that when I'm working on very large files, DigiKam
freezes and will not work with those huge images.

Also, it might be nice to have a "Keep same quality level as original"
(in percentages?) when saving a final image; this would assume some way
to determine the image quality at the start of editing or re-editing an
image. And if anyone wishes to see or try various long-horizonal-aspect
images, and to check the visual appearance when an image is divided
between two physical monitors, feel free to view several examples
(mostly borrowed web images, re-edited) at:
http://syntheticidea.deviantart.com/ . I've tried to form the final
images so they're not too distracting when seen on two monitors. The
central "division line" seems important to get the best-looking image
possible, without little distractions located at that half-way
division-line, separating two monitors. Sorry for my poor descriptions
and explanations here.

And only for Linux geeks: I hope the OS Geek Chart may be of some
amusement. Don't worry: all operating system users are screwed in this
snide "artistic work", but Linux users least of all. Here are the links:
http://addressunlisted.deviantart.com/art/OS-Geek-Chart-Anim-PNG-960p-176970150?q=gallery%3Aaddressunlisted%2F26276728&qo=1
<http://addressunlisted.deviantart.com/art/OS-Geek-Chart-Anim-PNG-960p-176970150?q=gallery%3Aaddressunlisted%2F26276728&qo=1>
and additionally
http://addressunlisted.deviantart.com/art/OS-Geek-Chart-Anim-GIF-960p-176969657?q=gallery%3Aaddressunlisted%2F26276728&qo=2
<http://addressunlisted.deviantart.com/art/OS-Geek-Chart-Anim-GIF-960p-176969657?q=gallery%3Aaddressunlisted%2F26276728&qo=2>
. You may have to stare at the thing for a few minutes before
understanding how ridiculous it is... In such an animation, any image
occupying a certain space is considered equal to or related to any other
image in that same spot, and progressions and relations may be implied.
I have other similar animations elsewhere, but won't bother you with the
details. This one is bad enough! (Of course, DigiKam was used for
initial editing and cropping, while GIMP made the animated GIFs, and the
Java Animated PNG Editor formed the animated PNGs.) Bye

_______________________________________________
Digikam-users mailing list
Digikam-users-RoXCvvDuEio< at >public.gmane.org
https://mail.kde.org/mailman/listinfo/digikam-users

Re: merge two digikam DBs

Peter Albrecht — 2012-05-22T17:57:10

Hello David,

you can configure this.

In "Settings"
  -> "Configure DigiKam..."
    -> "Metadata"
      -> "Behaviour"
        -> "Common Metadata Actions"
you can select
 "[x] Save image rating in metadata embedded in files"

This will write any further image ratings in your digiKam
database and the jpg file.

For all old jpgs:
  1. Start a search to get them all
  2. select all
  3. "Image" -> "Write Metadata to image"

To make sure, everything worked, I looked with a hex editor
(e.g. "Okteta" or just "xxd") at the jpg files. ;)

Regards,
Peter

On 21.05.2012 21:44, David Obando wrote:

file rename

David Vincent-Jones — 2012-05-22T17:17:25

File rename fails to include the 'hidden' metadata files in the process.

David

Re: Tags and metadata for photo and video

Cedric Macquat — 2012-05-22T09:14:07

Hello Jean-François,

thank you for your answer. Everything is clearer for me now. For the videos I will also use companion images. Like you said, it's not the best solution, but for the moment It'll be ok. So now I can start to also tag my video.

Best regards,

Cédric

P.S: if somebody else has something to add, don't hesitate!

Re: merge two digikam DBs

Anders Lund — 2012-05-21T20:21:22

Den 21-05-2012 21:44, David Obando skrev:
A really stupid, simplistic idea: make a search that finds all images in 
db A, select all, drag and drop to album in DB2

Anders

Re: merge two digikam DBs

David Obando — 2012-05-21T19:44:04

Hello,

thanks for the answer. I would like to migrate the ratings - these are
not written in the JPEGs, are they?

Best regards,
David

Am 20.05.2012 20:17, schrieb Peter Albrecht:

Where to find my digikam configuration

Geert Jan klinkhamer — 2012-05-20T08:21:44

Hallo,

I am since 4 years a user for digikam in gnome and very happy with the
functionality.
I am planning for a new computer on which I want to install the same
software with the same configuration. I have a way to transfer my software
repository.
But where to find my digikam configuration files, so I don't have to
manually input my tag-structure.
I found some but I don't know if it is all

Please your help.

Thanks.
_______________________________________________
Digikam-users mailing list
Digikam-users-RoXCvvDuEio< at >public.gmane.org
https://mail.kde.org/mailman/listinfo/digikam-users

Re: merge two digikam DBs

Peter Albrecht — 2012-05-20T18:17:35

Hello David,

if your database contains only jpgs (no raws or videos) you
could do this:

 1. write all metadata into those jpgs
 2. start a new database
 3. include both root folders, containing your databases

DigiKam should find and read metadata (tags, comments and
ratings) from your jpg files.
This way you could also include one database in another
existing one. You don't have to start with a new database.

This attempt fails, if you have:
 - raws with metadata (tags, ratings, ...)
 - videos with metadata (tags, ratings, ...)
 - metadata which can't be written to jpg files

Regards,
Peter

On 20.05.2012 15:04, David Obando wrote:

merge two digikam DBs

David Obando — 2012-05-20T13:04:08

Hi all,

I would like to merge two digikam DBs (v2.5.0). I found some posts on
the mailing list but couldn't find the description in the docs. The docs
linked from digikam.org to docs.kde.org do not exist btw.
Could anybody give me a hint how to do the merge?

Best regards,
David

Re: Where does Digikam store its tag configuration

Geert Jan Klinkhamer — 2012-05-20T08:28:05

Hello,

Thanks for the information. In summary: If I make a backup for the database
my configuration is save.

Greats
Op 9 apr. 2012 12:30 schreef "Christian Reiner" <foss-IGuAFssZLu1PGlAn+6CLhST4j+jCus6s< at >public.gmane.org>
het volgende:

_______________________________________________
Digikam-users mailing list
Digikam-users-RoXCvvDuEio< at >public.gmane.org
https://mail.kde.org/mailman/listinfo/digikam-users

Re: Digikam-users Digest, Vol 84, Issue 21

Elliot Newman — 2012-05-19T15:41:27

Thanks Larry, I am aware of the adobe converter, however I am looking for a Linux solution, I know that LibRaw supports this so was hoping digiKam had that functionality available. 

On 19 May 2012, at 13:01, "digikam-users-request-RoXCvvDuEio< at >public.gmane.org" <digikam-users-request-RoXCvvDuEio< at >public.gmane.org> wrote:

Re: Camera Raw read -> Linear DNG write

Larry — 2012-05-18T16:04:49

do not know what linear DNG specificaly is, but you can use DNG converter
tool (not Digikam) to convert your camera native RAW into DNG.

I use it to convert Nikon NRF files, since RAW processing tools don't like
NRF format too much

On Fri, May 18, 2012 at 4:54 PM, Elliot Newman
<elliot-n-5Ol4pYTxKWu0ML75eksnrtBPR1lH4CV8< at >public.gmane.org>wrote:

_______________________________________________
Digikam-users mailing list
Digikam-users-RoXCvvDuEio< at >public.gmane.org
https://mail.kde.org/mailman/listinfo/digikam-users

Camera Raw read -> Linear DNG write

Elliot Newman — 2012-05-18T15:54:57

Hello,

I am trying to find out if DigiKam allows you to read in a raw file (like canon CR2) and write out a linear DNG just like Adobe DNG Converter. I know LibRaw has support for this... more info on linear DNG:

http://www.barrypearson.co.uk/articles/dng/linear.htm

Thanks,
 - Elliot.
_______________________________________________
Digikam-users mailing list
Digikam-users-RoXCvvDuEio< at >public.gmane.org
https://mail.kde.org/mailman/listinfo/digikam-users

Re: Tags and metadata for photo and video

Jean-François Rabasse — 2012-05-17T15:28:37

Hello Cédric,
some comments as I see two different issues in your post.

On Thu, 17 May 2012, Cédric Macquat wrote:


The bad new is that (nothing but my own personal opinion) it doesn't
seem possible to expect setting up a tags strategy and keep it as is
along years or decades, and software changes.

Metadata world is a swampy and misty landscape. Some standards exist but
they mostly define data formats and labels, and are more unfocused on
data semantics and where to put what. A software development team may
have its own interpretation and another team may disagree and do
something different.
(Digikam itself does some interpretation in metadata handling, and not
everybody agrees.)

Also, software often needs some information not featured in standards
and will thus create its own namespaces for that.
Compatibility is then broken.
(Digikam does that. The tree structured tags system - a nice feature
indeed - is out of standards that propose only flat lists of keywords.
So, Digikam invents a special tag, xmp.digikam.tagslist, with special
syntax, Tag/Subtag/Subtag, that no other software will read.)

The good new (my personal opinion again) is that tagging and indexing
work should never be redone from scratch if you get prepared to do some
adaptation work. That work could be some home made scripts and command
line tools to extract all of your meta information, then feed under a
different way to suit the target management system.
(I happened to do that a few years ago, extracting structured indexes
from a SQL database, then rebuilding syntax compatible with
digikam.tagslist and feeding into images with exiftool. It took several
hours to build and check the tools but nothing was lost and it spared
hundreds of hours if reindexing from scratch would have to be done.)

The important thing is to tag and index fresh new stuff when it comes
under hand and trust for the future. Readable/writable information will
surely remain readable, and rewritable under a different form.



I have exactly the same problem, with non photos files. Videos yes,
and also, in my case, tracks logs GPX files I want to manage along with
images. The GPX format doesn't provide any metadata support, and Digikam
ignores that kind of file so, no XMP sidecar solution.

A possible solution is to create an image, JPEG format, for each of
those special files. For video files it's possible to use command line
tools as mencoder that allows extracting one video frame, the first one
or an offset one, and building a JPEG or PNG image. It works fine.
(For my GPX files, I use web services, e.g. GPS-visualizer that can create
a nice terrain map with the track overplotted in color.)

So, with Digikam, I don't tag the files but that « companion image ».
And when I do browse and search, I can find such an image and from name
and album name, I get the file. (Using a naming convention such as
xxxx.jpg is companion for xxxx.mpg, or xxxx.gpx, and lies into the same
folder.)

It's not that great, I admit, but it works well. If I happen some day to
know how to feed a video file with metadata, I'll probably move tags
information from the JPG to the MPG. As for today I don't know how, so I
live with thati, waiting for better days:-)

Maybe some other users will feed this thread with better ideas.

Regards,

Jean-François


PS: companion images, or placeholders, has recently been discussed on
this list, about an off-line data topic. Maybe for video files,
mostly very big files, indexing and managing a large video collection
could also require off-line data management along with that metadata
issue.
A companion image can merge both issues, for lack of anything better.
_______________________________________________
Digikam-users mailing list
Digikam-users-RoXCvvDuEio< at >public.gmane.org
https://mail.kde.org/mailman/listinfo/digikam-users

Tags and metadata for photo and video

Cédric Macquat — 2012-05-17T11:03:50

Hello,

I want to manage my photo collection and video collection with digikam.
With digikam I tagged my photos and I want to begin with the video. My
problem is the following: If I want to use another software to manage my
photos and video in the future (perhaps one time another one will fit
better to my needs, but for the moment digikam is perfect :-D) how can I
make sure I don't have to retag everything ? When I will have much more
photos and videos it won't be possible to do the work again. 
For the moment I did the following. At first I had photos in jpg format.
I had written the tags in the jpg files. But now I have a mixt of photo
in jpg and raw format. I can't write the tags in the metadata of the raw
format. It would be possible (I saw it's experimental for the moment) to
write in the raw files, but it's not advised. So I discovered the xmp
sidecar and I created for every tagged photos a .xmp file. 
But now I will tag my videos and with digikam it's not possible to
create a xmp file for videos. I think the best way the retain the tag is
to write in the metadata of the video, but how ? Or can I create an xmp
sidecar for video with another software ? At the moment I'm looking at
exiftool but until now I was not able to create an xmp sidecar for video
with the same format as for the photos. 
If you don't know: what is your strategy to make sure you won't have to
retag everything if you change one time digikam for another software ?
And for the developpers: is it planned in the near future that it will be
possible to create an xmp sidecar for videos ?

Thank you!

Re: BUG? move to album / overwrite destination problem

Jean-François Rabasse — 2012-05-17T09:35:48

Hello,

On Wed, 16 May 2012, Remco Viëtor wrote:


Thanks for the detailed explanation Remco. Sounds like it's a matter
of trustworthy and reliability of open source software wrt proprietary
formats.

But ok, this for raw files. And about JPEG files :

On Wed, 16 May 2012, Peter Albrecht wrote:


Seems that both of you agree on « keep originals as they are » .
Should lead to the conclusion that the « zero risk » procedure is to
archive (e.g. USB drive) all out-of-camera data, then copy all or
selected images on main computer and work.
(And backup processed apart from original.)

Regards,

Jean-François
_______________________________________________
Digikam-users mailing list
Digikam-users-RoXCvvDuEio< at >public.gmane.org
https://mail.kde.org/mailman/listinfo/digikam-users

Re: BUG? move to album / overwrite destinationproblem

Peter Albrecht — 2012-05-16T19:50:48

In reference to "and perhaps a bad idea for original
out-of-camera jpgs as well":
Writing metadata to JPGs works very well for me, for several
years now.

The only drawback I can think of is the mentioned "changing
the original".

But I decided for me, to _not keep_ the original
out-of-camera-jpgs. So I can live with this "issue". But
this is a decision everyone has to make him-/herself.

Regards,
Peter

HDR and 2.6.0 RC

POTTIER Michel — 2012-05-16T15:14:25

Hello all,
 I am trying to make HDR with two jpegs. In the tools menus I choose "fusionner les images prises en fourchettes". 
A box appears with the names of the binaries (align_image_stack 2011.4.0 and enfuse 4.0). Then "next", another box  with the names of the two images. 
Then "next" I arrive on  "aligner les images". Next "cette operation peut prendre un peu de temps" and "Le prétraitement a échoué (Preprocessing failed)" . 
By clicking on "details" open another empty box.
Running digikam in a terminal, i obtain the following output:
digikam
QSqlDatabasePrivate::removeDatabase: connection 'ConnectionTest' is still in use, all queries will cease to work.

(digikam:5848): GStreamer-CRITICAL **: gst_debug_add_log_function: assertion `func != NULL' failed
digikam(5848)/KIPI (general) KIPIExpoBlendingPlugin::ItemsPage::slotAction: Unknown action
Last line is when the preprocessing failed.


KDE Platform Version: 4.6.5 
Linux 2.6.38.8-desktop-10.mga x86_64  (Mageia 1)
Is it a bug?
Thank you for your help
_______________________________________________
Digikam-users mailing list
Digikam-users-RoXCvvDuEio< at >public.gmane.org
https://mail.kde.org/mailman/listinfo/digikam-users

Re: BUG? move to album / overwrite destinationproblem

Remco Viëtor — 2012-05-16T09:10:54

...

For me, there are two reasons to avoid writing to RAW files:
- They are the original, irreplacable data that I like to keep in its original 
state.  (I have backups, but still...)
- There is no such thing as _a_ raw format: every camera maker has his own 
formats (yes, plural :( ) And those formats are poorly specified, especially 
wrt to the 'makerdata' EXIF section, so it's very easy to corrupt something 
when writing to such a file. The situation is getting better through a lot of 
hard work from volunteers (not me, I hasten to add), but given the sheer 
number of raw formats in existence, there will probably always be formats that 
are not understood.

Also, RAW files in general only have EXIF data, part of which can be pure 
binary data, and possibly encrypted (makernote..)

Regards, 

Remco

Re: BUG? move to album / overwrite destination problem

Jean-François Rabasse — 2012-05-16T08:39:43


Hello,

I happened, at some occasions, to use hard links in a (maybe) similar way
as John does (have a folder with a bunch of images and some other folders
with selected images subsets).

I confirm Digikam doesn't recognize/handle links. When pathnames are 
different, the images are seen as different even if it's the same file,
and database entries are different too.

What I used to do for final cleanup after tagging/rating/indexing was :
  - Run the « Find duplicates » function on the root folder (nearest root
    above linked images),
    As linked files are the same, obviously the two images are found to
    be duplicates,
  - In the duplicates search results view, set the display filter to
    show only unrated/untagged images,
  - Select all, Ctrl-A, then delete.
  - After that, move, reorganise the remainding (rated/tagged) images.

(This worked well. I must say I no longer work like that. Now I tend to
copy SD-card content into a new folder, then browse the images and tag
those I want to keep, then move them into a final folder, then work.
The original folder with remainding images is only there in case
I would feel remorse.)

Regards,
Jean-François


PS: I have an off-topic question, about something Remco wrote in his
answer :


I've often read that kind of warning, on this list. From my naive point
of view, embedded metadata records, EXIF, XMP, sounds to be a nice thing
as one keeps all image information into one file. (And XMP sidecar files
doesn't seem to interoperate well betwen different applications.)

I'd be really interested in learning what could be potential problems and
why this seems to be a not recommended practice. Are there reasons related
to the libexiv2 to be not that stable and reliable, and writing metadata
could corrupt or destroy the file ? Or are there other reasons ?
Thanks for making that point become clearer to me.
_______________________________________________
Digikam-users mailing list
Digikam-users-RoXCvvDuEio< at >public.gmane.org
https://mail.kde.org/mailman/listinfo/digikam-users

Re: BUG? move to album / overwrite destinationproblem

John Stumbles — 2012-05-16T08:16:49


I just checked and dolphin has the same problem so it's really a bug in 
kde. Maybe I'm missing something but overwriting - bitwise copying - one 
file to another in order to move it seems like a really stupid thing to 
do! I wonder why kde doesn't actually do a `mv` when the source and 
destination are on the same filesystem? Maybe it was a bit of q&d coding 
(saving having to check whether a mv is possible) that hasn't been 
refined? (I know: it's open source, I should fix it myself instead of 
complaining about it! But it's not like a little C file: there's a huge 
learning curve to get up to start hacking on something like kde ... 
would take me months to get going :-()



One of the main ways I enjoy my photo collection is having my better 
pictures displayed on kde's slideshow screen-saver when my PC is idle. I 
acheive this by, when I've uploaded a set of photos containing some I'd 
like to have on the screensaver, I `cp -rl` the album to a directory in 
the tree the screensaver accesses; then I go through images in that 
directory deleting poorer ones and tweaking the better ones. So now I 
have one directory tree containing all my pictures, good and bad, and 
another tree ("show") containing only good ones, including some edited 
versions that aren't in the original tree. And since the "show" tree 
contains a significant amount of images, using hard links saves a 
worthwhile amount of space.

Now I've started using digikam I'd like to merge the "show" tree back 
into the originals tree. I could just copy (or hard-link) images in each 
album in the show tree back to their corresponding albums in the 
original tree but, since the photos in the "show" tree are all good, I 
can quickly star-rate them all and save myself having to re-rate all the 
pictures in the new, merged, tree.



Definitely with the snapshot backups: I've only got a 2.5TB drive 
backing up a 3.5TB array! Obviously it's not backing up everything on 
that array (I exclude DV videos for example) but even so I have to be 
careful what I do back up. Of course a de-duplicating file system (e.g. 
ZFS) would be the ideal: I did try setting something up but couldn't get 
whatever it was (I forget now) working.