P: Better keyword management

[joopsnijder]

How about some better support for keyword management. It's very basic now. I would like to do the following tasks:- Delete multiple keywords at once. Not all plugins do handle hierarchy keywords well and add all the keywords to the root level. It's a tedious task to delete them one by one.- Search for duplicates.- Merge keywords. With lots of tricks, it can be done, but it's so inefficient.- Import keywords from within any level in the keyword hierarchy. Now you can only import keywords to the root level.- And for now last but most important: Real external editing of the keyword list. Moving keywords around and doing real heavy reorganization is difficult in LR. I would like to have an editing option like exporting and when reimported all changes are reflected in LR.

[johnrellis]

Your method works fine when you have just a few keywords you want to change. But k64 has hundreds:

I have hundreds of Keywords arranged heirarchically (e.g. Places/Europe/UK/London/Greenwich ) but most of them have "Export Containing Keywords" selected.  I would very much like to untick this box on every Keyword.  To do this manually is totally impractical.

[rogsonl]

I see your point.

If my understanding is right, the keywords are maintained as a separate xml based file piggy backed to your images, like ExifLib does for the type of camera, the speed at which the picture was taken, etc. So, if I'm right, there might be an API which allows you to access that xml file and modify it as a batch process.

If you find the API, I'd be interested in helping. I have a software engineering background and 40+ years experience programming.

Good luck.

[johnrellis]

So, if I'm right, there might be an API which allows you to access that xml file and modify it as a batch process.

If you find the API, I'd be interested in helping.

That general process would allow you to change the keywords assigned to a photo, but not the attributes of the keywords themselves, like Export Containing Keywords. The only way to modify those attributes is to right-click an individual keyword in the Keyword List and select Edit Keyword Tag.

Years ago, I recall seeing a script someone posted for modifying the internal SQL database of the LR catalog, but such things are fragile, since the database scheme is undocumented and Adobe changes it now and then without notice.

[rogsonl]

You are right. Modifying a database is dangerous. Modifying a piggyback file on a single picture is not. You can modify it, re-insert it into Lightroom CC and see if the keywords have changed. XML is a well formed scheme so it should be human readable and understandable. If they are binary, forget it.

If the method works on a single image then the process would be: 1. export, 2. modify, 3. re-insert. All undoable at any stage.

Leon

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[FeedbackCommunityMember]

Hello,
I love Lightroom but it really needs a keyword panel/editor makeover. Photo Mechanic has a really nice keyword editor layout with columns where you can quickly and easily create, cut, paste, organize keywords and much more.
Can Adobe please do something like that but maybe cooler, since you're Adobe?

[Louie Sherwin]

Ever hopeful...

[shaugsburg]

I'm currently checking out alternatives, as painful as it may be...

[BlueRanger]

My problem is that I used Lightroom for many years before discovering the keyword hierarchy features, and I suspect that's not a unique experience. Now that I know how much easier I could have made things if I had known how it worked from the beginning, I'm finding it very unwieldy trying to go back and organize my existing, lengthy flat list into a useful hierarchy. It's not the comprehensive fix that I or a lot of others want, but one simple (I think) addition would be the ability within the Edit Keyword Tag dialog to specify a containing keyword from the existing list. This would eliminate a lot of drag-and-dropping when the two keywords are not close together alphabetically. 

[johnrellis]

I agree that keyword management could be much better. But a tip for reorganizing large keyword lists: In the Keyword List panel's Filter Keywords box, type the keyword you want to drag to and the keyword you want drag:



In this example, only keywords containing the string "people" or the string "richard" will be displayed. Now it's easy to drag "Richard III" to "People" without waiting for the panel to scroll painfully slowly.

[BlueRanger]

That's one trick I've been relying on, but I do mainly travel & landscape and it's not quite as effective when you're dealing with things like place names which often contain multiple common words. Another thing I'll do is temporarily modify one tag with an extra word so it sorts near the other one, then remove it again once the move is done.

[mastix]

I have used the plugin Find and replace to add some IPTC data to my keywords. I don't know why but when i exported them I say that this keywords did not appear on the exported files. I checked the export characteristics of those, and they all have the check include on export disabled. I can change it to enable but only one by one. With hundreds of files this is very tedious, with thousands impossible.

Is there any way to check that box at one of many selected files, or the one by one is the only route. If so, I would love to see in Lightroom the possibility to batch change the condition of selected keywords. (export, synonims etc). One by one does not seem very effective.

[johnrellis]

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Unfortunately, there is no way to batch-edit keywords -- it's been requested many times in the past.

"I have used the plugin Find and replace to add some IPTC data to my keywords. I don't know why but when i exported them I say that this keywords did not appear on the exported files."

You can enable the Include On Export attribute for keywords created by the Search Replace Transfer plugin.  Do File > Plug-in Manager, select the plugin, and make sure these options are checked:

[johnrellis]

Moderators, @Rikk Flohr: Photography  please merge with this existing Idea, where many have requested batch-editing of keywords:

https://community.adobe.com/t5/lightroom-classic-ideas/p-better-keyword-management/idi-p/12250327

[johnrellis]

Moderators, @Rikk Flohr: Photography, please merge with this existing Idea:

https://community.adobe.com/t5/lightroom-classic-ideas/p-better-keyword-management/idi-p/12250327

[mastix]

Thank you very much for the tip on how to export correctly. It works now.

It is really unfortunate the poor way Lightroom handles many basic attributes that are so important for a Dam solution like this bad management of Keywords, bad rename features etc.

After so many years and Lightroom is still far behind other organization dam solutions. We are bound to it because many edit with Lightroom but if that would not be the case I would never trust LR to manage my assets.

[johnrellis]

LR 13 finally provides enough functionality for plugins to provide batch (bulk) editing of keywords. The latest version of the Any Tag plugin has the ability to export keywords and their attributes to a .csv text file, edit the file, and import the changes back into the catalog. You can edit the file in Excel, Google Sheets, or a text editor, changing keyword attributes and names, adding and deleting keywords, and rearranging the keyword hierarchy.

So if you want to change the Include On Export attribute for all or some of your keywords, Any Tag gives a straightforward way to do it.