Photo Supreme advertising in my metadata

[rolandgifford]

I have recently discovered that Photo Supreme advertises itself in my metadata by setting Originating Program to Photo Supreme and Program Version to whatever relevant version of Photo Supreme

How do I stop it doing this?
What is the most efficient way of removing this data?

[G8DHE]

You will find most programs that alter the metadata places its identification under that heading, its purpose is to allow the program that made the last change to be identified! Its not advertising at all it allows the programs to identify which program carried out the change. Its actually part of the XMP definitions see https://exiftool.org/TagNames/XMP.html

[Hert]

The software tag is used to identify what software last changed the metadata. For some people that is very important. They use this info in a custom thumbnail line to identify what software last edited their metadata. Relevant if for instance you're running PSU in conjunction with a RAW editor that also tend to update metadata.

If you want to disable this (which I don't recommend) then run this registry tweak in the Tools -> Scripter

Code: Select all

WriteToRegistry('', 'UpdateSoftwareTag', 0);
Say('Please restart Photo Supreme');

To revert back to the default behavior, then run this script:

Code: Select all

DeleteFromRegistry('', 'UpdateSoftwareTag');
Say('Please restart Photo Supreme');

[rolandgifford]

Thank you Hert

[bimo]

Mmmmh - perhaps best to have a look at the specs: EXIF 2.32 describes the tag as follows

D38FEBE2-CD60-430A-9B5F-1AF3372E547E.jpeg (313.16 KiB) Viewed 3070 times

What I read from the specs:

• it‘s all about „generate“ not „last modified“

• topic is the „image“ not any metadata

• it‘s not totally clear whether originater must be a camera’s or another physical device‘s software/firmware or if also some device independent software could do the job as well. IMO software like Adobe DNG Converter which generates a DNG based on a RAW would be applicable as well.

My conclusion:
Interpreting the software tag as „software last modified“ isn‘t covered by EXIF 2.32. The tag should be initialized but not be changed. A DAM’s name and version should never be written to the tag when only adding/modifying metadata while software generating a new image part (e.g. jpeg from raw) could.

[Sigi]

Because of the reasons outlined above by Hert I prefer the way it is handled now. From a pure language point of view one can of course argue that the software which "last modified" a picture by definition "generated" the file and hence "last modified" and "generated" are actually the same. Without modifying you can not generate anything.

[bimo]

Without modifying you can not generate anything.

Without doubt that one is true - but it's not the topic. We are talking about generated images that are modified. And the specs tend to the first and not the last software/firmware being used.

I don't care at all if people prefer "Hert's way" or anything else because there is more than this tiny item people are using in contradiction to the appropriate specs but: you better should know where and when you disregard the specs. That's where my remarks aimed at.

[Sigi]

In my opinion the approach by PS and other software is exactly following the specs you posted above. The file I look at in PSU was modified and generated by PSU, so it should be written in that field.

[bimo]

Thank you for sharing your opinion. I think we should now cease our little discussion.