Adding a new keyword across more than 500 images

[Harry Harrison]

I search on a country in Alamy Image Manager to bring up 551 images.

 

I choose "Newest 500 passed"

 

I enter my new keyword in the Keyword field and click on '+'.

 

The keyword disappears but seemingly not into the forest of keywords already displaying.

 

The 'Save' button remains greyed out.

 

I do not pass Go.

 

Am I doing something wrong?

[Betty LaRue]

If any of those images already have 50 tags, a new tag won’t be added. The bane of our existence. I wish there could be a code written that would kick out those with 50 and add the tag to what remains, at least.

I’m not sure if that is what’s going on with you, but a possibility. If so, are you ready to go through those images one by one and delete down to 49 tags? I’d pull my hair out.

One reason to not populate 50 tags on new images, leave room. 45 is good.

Betty

[spacecadet]

15 minutes ago, Betty LaRue said:

If any of those images already have 50 tags, a new tag won’t be added. The bane of our existence. I wish there could be a code written that would kick out those with 50 and add the tag to what remains, at least.

I’m not sure if that is what’s going on with you, but a possibility. If so, are you ready to go through those images one by one and delete down to 49 tags? I’d pull my hair out.

One reason to not populate 50 tags on new images, leave room. 45 is good.

Betty

I sometimes put a new keyword at the end of the caption for this reason. Ugly but workable. Doesn't work in bulk, of course. So doesn't answer Harry's question, sorry.

The only way may be to cut them into smaller batches with the click and drag tool, then try to hack away some excess tags. If you succeed you can then tackle them over a few days, because the new tags will be live in search the next day, so you can exclude them with NOT.

Edit: Harry hasn't been here that long, so he won't have any overtagged legacy images. So his problem is something else. Ah well, we tried.

Edited August 28, 2019 by spacecadet

[Betty LaRue]

1 hour ago, spacecadet said:

 

Edit: Harry hasn't been here that long, so he won't have any overtagged legacy images. So his problem is something else. Ah well, we tried.

True. I didn’t pay attention to his “joined” status.

It must be something technical, which rules me out! 😊

I get the all-overs when I think about the legacy images nightmare.

[gvallee]

Two reasons I can think of why it might not be working:

1. What Betty and Mark said

2. If the keyword you are trying to add is already in one (or more) of the 500 images selected.

Both cases happen to me all the time.

 

Gen

[Harry Harrison]

5 hours ago, Betty LaRue said:

If any of those images already have 50 tags, a new tag won’t be added

Thanks Betty, that was actually true for one image to my surprise but AIM is smart enough to tell you to omit that one, I did that and it still wouldn't proceed. I then trimmed a few keywords from that image and started again, still no joy.

 

51 minutes ago, gvallee said:

If the keyword you are trying to add is already in one (or more) of the 500 images selected.

Both cases happen to me all the time.

Well, that might be true, I guess I might have added it to one in the process, but I didn't realise that might stop things. I'll try it with a keyword that I know isn't in any of them.

 

 

5 hours ago, spacecadet said:

If you succeed you can then tackle them over a few days, because the new tags will be live in search the next day, so you can exclude them with NOT.

Thanks, didn't know about the 'NOT' option.

Edited August 28, 2019 by Harry Harrison

[spacecadet]

11 hours ago, Harry Harrison said:

Thanks Betty, that was actually true for one image to my surprise but AIM is smart enough to tell you to omit that one, I did that and it still wouldn't proceed. I then trimmed a few keywords from that image and started again, still no joy.

 

Well, that might be true, I guess I might have added it to one in the process, but I didn't realise that might stop things. I'll try it with a keyword that I know isn't in any of them.

 

 

Thanks, didn't know about the 'NOT' option.

Look up "boolean" if you need to. AND, OR and NOT all work.

Edited August 29, 2019 by spacecadet

[Harry Harrison]

27 minutes ago, spacecadet said:

Look up "boolean" if you need to. AND, OR and NOT all work.

Yes, thanks, I hadn't thought to use them in that context. I take your point about doing it over a period of days, it was a surprise to me at first to know that any changes in AIM would only take effect after the server had updated, makes this sort of thing rather long-winded.

 

You've also helped with another question I was going to ask, namely once I've got to grips with adding a keyword across the first 500 how do I manage the second, and the the third.... 

I suppose it's those Boolean search terms again, but the following day.

[spacecadet]

I think that search by image reference or filename is internal to AIM, likewise the filter bar, but anything else uses the general search, so you have to wait for it to update.

You'll notice that if you update a caption, the mouseover pop-up caption doesn't change. Same thing.

Edited August 29, 2019 by spacecadet

[Phil Robinson]

On 28/08/2019 at 21:39, gvallee said:

2. If the keyword you are trying to add is already in one (or more) of the 500 images selected.

 

 

Yes, this happens a lot, and it's why I was very disappointed when they stopped displaying the keywords in alphabetical order. They were a lot easier to find then, but it didn't last long. 

[Avpics]

Regarding the 'already a tag on one of the images' option, if you're using Chrome (may apply to other browsers but I only use the one) once you've selected and highlighted the first 500, [ctl]+f brings up a word search tool. Search the word you're looking to add to all of them and it'll find it amongst all the tags. Then you can just click on that word to add it to them all.

[Harry Harrison]

31 minutes ago, Avpics said:

Search the word you're looking to add to all of them and it'll find it amongst all the tags. Then you can just click on that word to add it to them all.

Thanks, I was using Chrome and I did try that but I think the problem for me was that the keyword also appeared in the captions so Ctl+F brought up a very large number of instances 'on the page', maybe I gave up too early. I haven't actually tried that bulk editing again since I posted but I do need to, I still don't know why it wasn't working.