New User's Interface questions

[levelbest]

Hello, I am still on the demo of Photo Supreme. At this point it is looking like I will become a customer. I am posting here for two reasons, to see how active this board is and if I get a response to my questions here, and, my questions.

The first question I have is about hiding and showing the left and the right panels. I can see that command - I hides and shows the right information panel. As yet I cannot see how to do this on the left panel and why sometimes I see a left panel with search information already set and other times I see the database targets. An important subset of this is that I am also trying to understand how PS is showing me what I am looking at as far as my structure goes.

I have additional questions about some problems I am having with importing files (seems limited to 25k). I am also not sure about creating extra databases and what best practices to use - combining databases (can you do it). But the first thing I want to understand is how to look at the inte5rface and moving or hiding panels I am using.

This looks like a promising bit of software. Glad to have found it.

David

[sanphotgn]

As far as I know, the left hand panel is always visible. It can be resized.

Under Help in the menu, click on the Quick Start Manual. This manual discusses the left hand panel's Catalog and Folders.

From the manual:

Catalog: "The CATALOG is a representation of your database; it is the container of all information that
is managed by Photo Supreme."

Folders: "As images are added to your catalog, Photo Supreme records where the images are
physically located on your hard drive, and stores that location in the catalog database."

Note there are other manuals available under Help. Another source of information is the Tips button in the main toolbar. Click on the button and hover your mouse over the area or button or option in the program for more information.

Before importing hundreds or thousands of images, I recommend importing a few dozen images that are copies of copies to get an idea how everything works.

You can create additional databases. You can't combine databases. Additional databases: depending on what you want to do, you can have the additional databases share resources (profiles, schemas, vocabularies, ...) or have the additional databases have their own set of resources.

[levelbest]

... Catalog: "The CATALOG is a representation of your database; it is the container of all information that
is managed by Photo Supreme." Folders: "As images are added to your catalog, Photo Supreme records where the images are
physically located on your hard drive, and stores that location in the catalog database."

Note there are other manuals available under Help. Another source of information is the Tips button in the main toolbar. Click on the button and hover your mouse over the area or button or option in the program for more information.

Before importing hundreds or thousands of images, I recommend importing a few dozen images that are copies of copies to get an idea how everything works.

You can create additional databases. You can't combine databases. Additional databases: depending on what you want to do, you can have the additional databases share resources (profiles, schemas, vocabularies, ...) or have the additional databases have their own set of resources.

Thanks for the reply. Yes I have downloaded the manual pages and I have been reviewing them. But some explanations make more sense in the doing or trying out of them. I do understand the concept of a catalog but I was unsure of how they are delivered to the user in this app. For example, DevonThink allows multiple catalogs (databases = catalogs). It also allows you to combine them or to combine select them. In other words, I can have two catalogs in DT and by selecting them both while they are open I can search across both of them at the same time. Or, I can actually combine them.

Remember that I am hitting a wall on imported file limits being capped at 25,000. I had to import based on maximum size of a folder. And that means of course, that I have to import more than one catalog to get to all my images. Without being able to combine or select multiple catalogs how can I work though all my images?

I should say that there are two things I need to do with this software. In the beginning I need to cull the herd as I have many duplicates to attend to. This was left over from various bad decisions and once remedied should not continue to be a problem. Even so, it is the first challenge I have to face. After that of course I will be using it like anyone else, using keywords, choosing best shots, keeping versions together, etc.

I backed up all my images before testing this out so yes, I am throwing all I have at it as a test. Or at least, as much as it can allow. I don't know about having a 25K import limit and if that is a demo limitation or of that is a permanent limitation. I hope that this software is not limited to only 25K images? If true I would have to pass on getting it - but I cant imagine this is true.

As far as I know, the left hand panel is always visible. It can be resized.

That is too bad. I would want to make a suggestion about that to the developer right away. He seems helpful and supportive so perhaps this could be considered? Even when I hide the info panel there is a large gap that takes up screen space. One of the key features of this app is it's versatility and it's good use of key stroke commands. Given that this is about reviewing many photos, why wouldn’t you want to maximize display space for your images. With a quick keystroke you can quickly reveal or hide the panels you need to work.

[Preston B]

As sandfhotgn suggested, it is best to import only a small set of images so that you can learn to work with PSu. Once you are comfortable, and purchase the application, then you can import your images.

While it is true that PSu cannot combine databases (catalogs), you can create as many catalogs as you need and switch between them by going to Tools>Catalog and select what you want to do, e.g. select the catalog you want (assuming it is already created), compact the current catalog, or create a new catalog.

The 25K limit applies only to the trial version. We always suggest that users, especially new users, import small batches of images at a time. A very large import can take long time to complete.

Personally, I like having the Catalog/Folders pane open all of the time. I use the Folders view extensively, so having it readily available is a plus for me.

Photo Supreme is an excellent application, one that I have used for a long time. It is very robust and powerful. Once you become acclimated to it, it will make your image management quite easy.
--P

[jstartin]

Rest assured, plenty of users have many, many more than 25k images in a single PSu catalog.

The "explorer" panel on the left can easily be hidden. Find the "View" button towards the top of the screen and on the right. Click it and then click on "Maximized".

At the top of the panel you should see buttons to switch between "Catalog" and "Folder" based views. The former also has a down arrow providing many different catalog-based views.

On the right of the screen you can have any one of several panels, or none. Most of the buttons on the lower right switch between various panels such as label assignment, image adjustment, batch operations, image information etc.

PSu is a superb tool for managing a digital photo collection. But, with power come some areas of complexity. I strongly recommend that you become thoroughly familiar with the concepts and terminology of PSu before you commit yourself to importing and organising a large number of images. I also suggest you invest plenty of time in studying and understanding the "Preferences", especially those related to "Synchronize Settings".

[sanphotgn]

The "explorer" panel on the left can easily be hidden. Find the "View" button towards the top of the screen and on the right. Click it and then click on "Maximized".

Thank you jstartin. The keyboard shortcut is:

Toggle Maximized Mode
Windows: Ctrl+M
MacOSX: Cmd+M

[levelbest]

Rest assured, plenty of users have many, many more than 25k images in a single PSu catalog.

The "explorer" panel on the left can easily be hidden. Find the "View" button towards the top of the screen and on the right. Click it and then click on "Maximized".

Thank you both for your replies. I am glad to hear the 25K limit was just for the demo. An unexpected plus is how I have learned I can set a custom view of thumbnails. This allows me to find duplicates and see the date the file was created. I would not have looked to this application to cull my many duplicate files. I already have some deduplication applications. This makes me feel very confident in what I am doing.

It is probably sensible for most folks to test this on a small number of files first. But I need to test it with an understanding of how stable it is with all I can throw at it. So far, so good. After I cut down on the extra files I will begin to use the labels and the versions too.

At this point I an not going to worry too much about key-wording as I am more interested in learning how this app works and also to start to focus on what I want to keep. When I turn in my demo license for a real one, I will probably trash the catalogs that I have created, refocus some folders, and see if I can get them all into one catalog. Then I will start with the key-wording.

Now I can remember two key strokes and maximize the screen (hiding the left) and/or show or hide the info bar to the right.

Yes, I plan to study the manual for this app. I see there are scripts and all sorts of tricks that at the moment I am probably not ready for yet. At this point I am leaning pretty strongly toward purchasing the app before my 30 days are up .

David

[Hert]

There's no 25k catalog size limit in trial versions.

David probably ran into the 25k *display* limit (macOS). This means that max 25k thumbs are displayed in a result set.
Then again, what's the use of displaying that many thumbs. The whole point is to catalog and not having to resort to delving through large result sets.
There are some older DAM tools out there where you'd have to start with all images and then filter down to get shat you want. David is probably used to this approach and tries to mimic that in PSU. However, in PSU it works the other way around: search what you need.

[levelbest]

The only DAM tools I am familiar with are Photo Mechanic v4 and Lightroom v1. I am not aware of having any expectation other than I was trying to import a (large) folder. The error may have been a display limitation or an import limitation. At this point I am not familiar enough with how Photo Supreme works to know the difference. I can see that Photo Supreme makes separate catalog and a thumbs databases. Why and how this happens is something that I don't fully understand at this time - or probably need to understand to make this work. If I get an error dialog while I am trying to import more than 25K images and that error dialog is only referencing the displayed thumbs (but the import process is unaffected) then it might be a good idea to revisit the wording on that warning so that the user understands that the import was successful - but the visual display of thumbs has been reached - or something like that.

[tedcrowtherc]

Re: when I click on labels screen (cntrl Shift L) the label screen opens but it is too large. How do I shrink it

[tedcrowtherc]

I installed vs 1613 and there is no change. The labels screen (cntrl shift L) is still too large to use. Help

[Hert]

Can you post a screenshot? Right now it’s unclear what “labels screen” you refer to.

[tedcrowtherc]

The labels screen you get when you click (Cntrl Shift L)

I copied the screen shot but it will not paste here.