set date range greyed out; timeline is empty

[williaml62916825]

Elements 2020. I am scanning and importing old photos taken before digital cameras. The imports are fine but the dates are obviously wrong (the dates are set to import date). I change the time/date to be correct. But timeline remains empty and the set date range option is greyed out. Need these to search later. Where is infomation for time/date on timeline kept? What do I do to fix this? Thanks in advance for any help with this.

[Greg_S.]

I'm not sure I understand your questions.  Can you post a screenshot of your timeline and the "greyed out" set date range option.

[MichelBParis]

I am afraid that if you only assign dates and not times to your scans, many search tools won't work, even on the newer version.
Maybe try to assign a ficticious time to a set of your scan files and see if that solves the timeline issue and the view >> set date range option ?

My guess is that if the date and time is not fully described, it's impossible to index for searches without assigning arbitrary and false time values.

[williaml62916825]

Thank you. I'll try that. I did not assign times, and sometimes I didn't
assign actual dates, only months. I will let you know..

[williaml62916825]

Michel

Thanks again for the reply. I went back and added dates and times certain to all the photos so far scanned. Didn't matter. The set date range option is still greyed out and the timeline is empty (no bars). From where does that data come (metadata? or file data?). Do you have any other ideas? Thanks.

[MichelBParis]

In my own case, I could see the timeline and access the date range, but about twenty files without time did not appear. Assigning arbitrary times did solve the problem.

The date_taken is managed in the catalog, it's one of the main indexes in the sqlite database.

If you edit it, only the catalog is updated;  you would have to 'write metadata to files' to update the different fields storing the date_taken in the metadata header.

I have no other idea about what can create that issue for you, unfortunately.

[williaml62916825 · Accepted solution]

Turns out the problem was simple to fix. You cannot have sort by name set.
It needs to be a different sort. Thank you for your responses, however.
--
Sent from my iPhone

[Greg_S.]

Turns out the problem was simple to fix. You cannot have sort by name set.
It needs to be a different sort.

That's why a screenshot would have been useful.  😉  Glad you were able to sort this out by yourself. 

[williaml62916825]

Thank you for your reply. I'm not sure what a screen show will add. There
isn't anything in the timeline to show. And the date range option is greyed
out. Another reply suggested it was because you have to add an actual date,
and a time. I'll try that. Any other thoughts?

[Greg_S.]

Michel has given you the best answer and I have nothing to add.  I never use the View>Date Range option, preferring the timeline calipers, so I had totally forgotten about it.  Thankfully, Michel is always around to remind me of these features.