Problem dragging keyword tags in LR 3

Hi, I am helping a user who has many keywords in Lightroom (hundreds). He usually tags images with keywords by dragging a keyword tag from the Keyword Tags panel onto an image in the grid. But the last 32 tags are not working. When he clicks on one of the problem keywords in the Keyword Tags panel, it is not selected. Instead, a vertical line appears at the mouse pointer and he can't select or drag that keyword. (see image) The many keywords above the problem ones work as expected. The problem keywords used to work, they just started not working in the last couple days. Any suggestions? Thank you!
Message was edited by: Pris Sears (formatting)

Thanks for the info! I wonder what the maximum for keywords is? I am not sure that's the problem here since they did work until this week, but I will suggest the hierarchical option to the user.
Is it possible that they keyword list got corrupted somehow? Is there a way to repair it?
thanks again

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Copy File From One Drive to Another & Missing Keyword Tags

Hi,
I use LR 2.7. I want to copy one file from one drive to another drive with the same file name. I thought you could drag the file, but it doesn't copy over the file in the other drive, can you explain what I have to do?
Also, I tried to import the folder into another drive, but it doesn't copy the keyword tags. Is there a way to do this?
Thanks
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Hey Barb,
Well, if you use the Year/Month/Day/pictures_here format, none of the folders contains a massive amount of folders. It's not the number of folders that generates problems, it's having them all in _one_ folder that creates slow-down issues. Imagine if you had a deck of cards; look for one card... you have to go through all 52 cards to find it. But, if you broke it down into the 4 groups, you only have to go through 13, which is lots faster. Now imagine going through 15000 instead of 52...
Look at the way lightroom can automatically import by date; it has several preset formats. If you pick one of those, then when you import new photos, it will automatically create any missing ones, and you have lots less to do.
Depending on how much work you have already done, you might consider making a new catalog and just importing all of your photos again, and let it create everything quickly for you.
You could save all of your "edit" changes by writing out all of the xmp files first. But with 15000 files in one directory, this will double it to 30000 (one per image!), but will preserve all of your edits if you choose to make a new catalog approach.
As for combing catalogs, once you have one catalog the way you want it, you can select "import from catalog" and it will suck it into a new one, thus combining the catalogs. The only problem I can see is that it will import it in the format you already have it, so you have to organize it manually before you import it. Otherwise, you'll get your old format and your new format in the one catalog (but can then move pictures around if you need to).
Personally, I'd go the 'write xmp files, create new catalog' approach. Then just recreate my collections, etc.
But either way you do it, it will take some time processing, as that's a lot of files to start with!
Ciao!
Jason

Problems with keywords assignment (hierarchy is included)

Hi group,
this probably happens after I was letting Lightroom to a catalog optimization, but I am not quiet sure about this.
So what happens: As you know, you can create a keyword tag hierarchy and sometimes LR does this automatically.
If I now do some keyword assignments in the library mode (right panel), then these keywords get replaced by a hierarchy-to-keyword string.
E.g. if I enter a keyword 'female' and LR has a hierarchy for this (e.g. female and male are sup-levels of person), then the keyword tag entry area contains the following: person > female. If e.g. I assign both male and female e to an image, then I get as result: person > female, person > male.
This blows up the list and does not make it very readable.
Does anybody knows how to stop LR doing this? If haven't found any flag value in the options.
Thanks in advance
John

John, I think this is just part of the poor design of the key-wording feature. There are many oddities. I got my initial keyword list from D65. I found that when I use the "Enter Keywords" view of the keywords assigned to a particular image, many of them show the hierarchy they are part of, as if I had selected the "Keyword & Containing Keywords" option, but some do not. Adobe told D65 that this is related to how you create the hierarchical entries. If you create a keyword and use the "Create keyword tag inside XXXXX" option, in use it will act differently than if you drag-and-drop a keyword into an hierarchical relationship. This is completely at odds with proper programming practice! I have also found today (in LR4, by the way) that if I sync from an image with keywords to an image without keywords immediately to its left, I get duplications of keywords in the rightmost image, as if the rightmost image had updated the left one, and it had reflected the sync back to the originating image. This does not happen if I sync from the leftmost image to the rightmost one. So I went into the keyword list and unchecked that keyword for the image that had the duplication. Now I have the keyword just once, but there's no check beside it in the keyword list showing that it is being used. I'm also getting duplicates of nested keywords popping up at the top level of the hierarchy. I've just realized that this has been happening for some time. The whole keyword feature is a mess. Adobe needs to:
1. fix the keyword feature so that it works in a simple, consistent and predictable manner
2. provide users with a documentation update to explain how it now works
3. provide a cleanup utility of some sort (if necessary) to let us get our keywords rationalized
Perhaps step 0. should be "stop ignoring and/or denying the keyword problem".
I've just gotten into such a mess with my latest batch of imported photos that I'm going to have to delete all assigned keywords, including those added on import, and start again. I am not amused.
JVH

Better keywords/tagging

I love Bridge, I use it every day. But it's major weakness for me is the tagging system and filtering by keyword. Right now I'm using Bridge/ACR for my importing, sorting and viewing. But I actually open Windows Live Photo for tagging and filtering by tag.I would rather not use two separate programs for my cataloging workflow. I hope you harvest ideas from the competition for CS6. These are the ways I think Windows Live does it better:
Windows Live
Bridge CS4
One simple, elegant panel for adding keywords, tagging, filtering
2 confusing panels, have to go back and forth
Drag and drop
Annoying checkboxes
Nested tags
Bridge has nested tags as well, but it doesn't do a good job of reading the nested tags I made in Windows Live. It formats them as "places/canada/toronto" rather than a proper checkbox hierarchy. And vice versa, windows live doesn't recognize the Bridge hierarchy. I wish there was consistency.
face recognition, geo tagging
right now it can't even recognize the existing people tags and geo tags, let alone add new ones. Picasa had no problem seeing the ones added in windows live, so it can't just be a proprietary thing

Not an expert on this subject, but before you comit a lot of time on this project in Bridge, explore other options as well, such as digital access management programs.
Bridge is not really set up for Network use although some use it that way. Also, Lightroom and Photoshop Elements stores the keywords in a database, while Bridge stores it on the image. Although I have never used the other programs, it seems lke it would be easier to search.

"Error Applying Keyword Tag(s)" in PSE 12

When I drag an album name onto an image (or vice versa) in Organizer 12 to add the image to the album I get an error dialog with the message "Error Applying Keyword Tag(s)" and the image is not added to the album. How can I fix this? Thanks.

HI,
I don't think the rename was necessary as I didn't do that - I think it was the creation of a new album that did the trick. It must be a sort of permissions problem.
Glad it is now working for you.
Your can have the beer for me, I'm in the UK and well into my retirement so I probably won't be over there in the near future.
Brian

Compare 'Folder tags' to imported Keyword Tags

I have asked questions about thumbnails in PSE11 that aren't being correctly displayed ,but I have yet to get any answers.
I though perhaps I should breakdown the problem into easier component to see if I can get to understand just what is going on & be able to fix the problem myself.
For instance if I open the 'My Folders' I see a list of file names that correspond to those 'imported keyword tags.' If I take a folder called China I see the thumbnails & when I hover the mouse I see that it has tags China,Beijing area & my wife's name. If I were then to go to the imported Keyword Tags & I can see a tag 'Dubai'. Just to see what happens I drag the picture to the Dubai tag. This is accepted. Because if I go back to the original tag I now see tags China,Beijing area,& my wife's name as well as Dubai.
If I go the see the folder 'Dubai' in my folders the picture doesn't appear. Why not? This is just a crazy experiment but I can't make out what happened. Any Ideas?

Hi,
Photoshop Elements does not enforce a direct relationship between Folders and Tags - they are different ways to view your images.
If you start by showing all media and then select a folder, you will get the all the images in that folder shown.
If you start by showing all media and then select a tag, you will see all the images with that tag.
If you start by showing all media, then select a folder and then select a tag, you get all the images in that folder that have the selected tag.
A tag can be applied to any image irrespective of which folder it is in.
For instance, if you have two folders called Holiday 2012 & Holiday 2013 with photos of your holidays for each of the years and in each year you have a photo of the same monument, you could tag those photos with the monument name. Later you could view all the holiday photos for a particular year or you could show the photos of the monument for the two years.
It is possible to create tags from the folder name but the relationship is not maintained.
The fact that you talk about "Imported keyword tags" suggests that you entered the tags outside of Photoshop elements before you imported them. If you had a previous version of Photoshop elements, the normal approach is to convert the old catalog. That way the tags would show up in the original structure rather than be "imported".
I hope that the above helps - forgive me if I stated what you already knew.
Brian

Move categories/directory from the keyword tag to the event/place/people tags

I just upgraded to PSE 12. So now all my organisation folders are under the "keyword" tag. And I have a lot of them. Of course they are organized in folder/subfolders. And the main ones are "places" "events". The same as the default ones in pse.
So is it possible to move categories/directories from the keyword tag to event/place/people tags (drag and drop doesn't work).
Thanks.

I have the same problem. I have had it since PSE 11 but didn't understand why I had two places for persons. I have the same problem with PSE 12 too and now I understand that the problem is there because I upgraded an english PSE 10 to a swedish PSE 11 (and later PSE12).
Could this be solved in any other way than moving the tags by hand ( I have a lot of people taged)?
Thanks / Gorbav

Keyword Tags Won't Delete

I am using Lightroom 1.4.1 on a Vista platform. When I delete keyword tags they disappear temporarily, only to reappear later. I have tried the Purge Unused Keywords function and I have tried to right click the keyword and select Delete. In all cases they seem to be deleted, but reappear later. I have removed the keywords in question from any photos they were applied to, so all the keywords that I'm trying to delete show 0 images. Here is a sample of the keywords: <component; <place; <worklist. Could the "<" sign in the keyword name be the problem? I have tried to rename the keywords, thus removing the "<" from the name, but they still keep coming back. Some more info which may be important in resolving this. These keyword names appear to have been created by Lightroom itself of Photoshop CS3 (V10.0). I originally had keywords enclosed in brackets, eg <place>. When I edited the images with the Develop module and Photoshop, once I returned to the Library module the edited image would have the system created keyword, eg <place (without the closing bracket). In other words I now had two keywords for the same thing: <place> and <place.

Tried the throw away top level key word idea as you suggested, but it didn't resolve the problem. I also deleted the 'dud' keywords from Bridge and Windows Photo Gallery and then went back to Lr and tried the suggestion again. It still didn't work. There are 3 dud keywords that keep reappearing in Windows Photo Gallery, despite having been deleted. It's amazing how all but three seem to have gone for good from Windows Photo Gallery. What makes the three persistent ones special, I have no idea.
What's puzzling is that once I've deleted the dud keywords and then export my keywords to a text file, the text file is 'clean'; like they've gone from Lr. However, when they reappear and I export my keywords again to a text file, they show up in the text file.
It like they're hiding away in the image files or some database in such a way that I can't access them and when I edit or rename a 'good' keyword it causes Lr to re-read the image file or database and import the keywords. This, despite that fact that none of the dud keywords show up in the metadata for any of my images as displayed by Lr; eg in the Keywording panel on the right. They also no longer show up in Bridge or Windows Photo Gallery (except for 3). Furthermore, all the dud keywords show '0' for the number of images they're assigned to.
By the way, I've also tried the Purge Unused Keywords function to no avail.

A question about keyword tags

Is it possible in settings... or somewhere, to set it so that when you open (PrE9's) organizer instead of starting with keyword hierarchy list - it could open on keyword cloud view? I am not so keen on the hierrarchy method...
Thanks.
brush

I did some experimenting in the Elements 9 Organizer.
1-- yes, when you close the Organizer then it does always seem to come up next time with the Thumbnail grid AND the Tags panel on the right is set to Hierarchy view. Then you must click on the icon for Cloud view.
2-- my conclusion is that if I click on the Cloud icon after starting the Organizer, then it was staying as Cloud in the Keyword Tags panel to the right of the Thumbnails for the duration that the Organizer is open.
3-- Note that if you use Full Screen for viewing your photos, then for the "Quick Organize" panel that drags out from the left side of the screen near the bottom, the default for Keyword Tags is Cloud. This is a different method of working which you may or may not like: however since it does set Cloud I decided to mention it.
FYI - to get to Full Screen you can use the pull down menu for the Display icon (that is next to the House icon on the top bar of the main Organizer screen). Choose the option "View, Edit, Organize in Full Screen". FYI - I usually select the thumbnails of the photos which I want to Organize before I go in to Full Screen.

Problem Importing Keywords with jpg photos into Library

I am a new and enthusiastic LR user working to migrate from iMatch, where I have kept my ~80,000 photos organized for the last several years. However, my last roadblock to being able to do that is the import of keyword information (or as iMatch calls them, Categories). Obviously it's critical that these transfer across seemlessly as they represent untold number of hours in sorting and managing the database.
The situation: Via an iMatch script I can successfully write the associated categories, including hierarchy, into an IPTC field of my choosing that is then included with the jpg file itself. I have done this into the "Keywords" field, with various combinations of special characters and/or spaces to denote hierarchy relationships or separate keywords.
Upon LR import: LR recognizes the presence of the keywords and pulls them into the metadata, but refuses to see them as anything except part of one continuous hierarchy.
Example: A picture in iMatch has two Categories associated with it, both of which are organized under a parent-->child hierarchy:
Trips --> Switzerland2006 and Special --> Family --> Daughter
When written via script into the IPTC Keyword field of the jpg file, it looks like this: Trips.Switzerland2006; Special.Family.Daughter
(note -- I can make the semicolon separating the keywords anything, such as a comma, space, etc. I have tried all.)
When imported into LR, it ends up looking like this under the left panel Keyword Tags area: Trips --> Switzerland2006; Special --> Family --> Daughter
In the righthand panel under "Keyword Tags", I only see "Daughter" as this is at the bottom of the single stack hierarchy that was interpreted.
In other words: I have found no possible way for LR to recognize that there is in fact MORE THAN ONE keyword coming in, rather than always a single hierarchy stack or very long words with spaces, semicolons, whatever included in between.
I have tried every setting under Preferences-->File Handling, but those only give me options about when to tell LR to recognize a hierarchy step, not about what character to see as a separation between keywords themselves.
Final note: If I first open one of my picture files in Adobe Bridge and look at the IPTC field Keyword there, it looks perfect. And if I go into that field and mess around a bit -- add a space, take away a space -- with in the end no change, then resave the file, THEN bring into LR, it works fine! I believe what is happening in this case is that Bridge is correctly interpreting the Keyword data from the file, but then is writing it into an XMP area that I can't see. LR must then read the XMP area in preference over the IPTC are upon import.... But -- if Bridge can read the original IPTC line correctly, why not Lightroom?!
Bottom line question: What format or special character or special trick must be used for multiple keywords in the IPTC Keyword field so that Lightroom will correctly recognize the multiple keywords upon import?
Thank you!
JMC

Do those keyword hierarchies show up properly in Vista Photo Gallery? I have the LR Edit/Preferences/File Handling configured to treat "/" (which is what Vista Photo Gallery uses) as a keyword separator and LR recognizes the hierarchical keywords.
As I understand it, Vista reads both XMP and IIM/IPTC Headers, but will write only to XMP. I forced Photo Gallery to convert my keywords to XMP by adding a global keyword and then deleting it later. Then I used drag and drop to recreate the hierarchies. It works for me.

To be able to Export Keyword Tags to Excel or as a CSF file

I am using PSE 10 in Windows 7 environment. Have thousands of photos and hundreds of Keyword tags and many Categories and Sub-Categories.
It would be nice to have these Tags & Categoris names in an Excel file (or, comma separated text file) that I can use to easily see what Tags I have so that I don't create new tags with slightly different names. Such an easy-to-access and mange Excel file will be very helpful, I think, to the overall cration and management of Tags.
I have done quite a bit of research on the web and also in PSE forum, but have not found any ways to do this.
Is this possible? Sure would appreciate any help and ideas.
Thank you so much.

Thank you all for your help. I have solved my problem - with your help. Solution was simple:
Save the Keyword Tags as the XML file from the drop down arrow options of the Keyword Tags. Saved it on desktop - but I guess you can save it anywhere you want. Opened MS Excel. Click File/ Open and Selected the XML file saved earlier. In the Dialogue Box that opens up, selected the "As an XML table" option. In the next dialogue box, showing "The specified XML source does not refer to a schema. Excel will create schema based on the XML source data.", clicked OK button.
Excel now creates the table and it filles the schema as the Column names. I deleted the columns that I don't need - most of these are values expressed in hex or some other numbering system. I kept FIVE columns that have the Keyword Category and the Tags names -
tagset-item-value-name
tagset-item-value-name3
tagset-item-value-note
tagset-item-value-name6
tagset-item-value-note8
Now I can play with them as I need - sort, resquence, print, etc.
Hope this helps others. And, again, thank you for your help.

HELP Keyword Tags - Photos do not appear under Keyword

At the moment I am just trying to get my head round how the LR works and I am looking at the Library.
I'm using Windows XP.
I have imported a few hundred photos and they can clearly be seen in two folders that replicate the actual folders on the hard disk.
I have assigned a number of keywords to these photographs. However, when I want to see the photographs allocated to a particular keyword nothing appears. I get a note just above the Film Strip that says something like:
"Keyword Tags / [Selected Keyword] / 0 of ### photos"
LR obviosly knows that ### photos have been assigned to the selected keyword but it does not display them. I've spent hours trying to get this working and before the men in white coats come and drag me away can somebody please give some indication where I'm going wrong.
Thanks in advance
Brian

I guess I have'nt played with it as much as you have, and you don't use keywords. Doesn't make sense, though keywords should be context sensitive to search a Collection or Folder rather than only all photographs. More powerful selective searching that way.
Can't check it now because LR is tied up in a Wifi Reference import to my laptop.
Don
Don Ricklin, MacBook 1.83Ghz Duo 2 Core running 10.4.8 & Win XP, Pentax *ist D
http://donricklin.blogspot.com/

How Do I Sort a Group of Photos on the Same Page with the same Keyword Tag?

I want to group similar photos on the same page with the same keyword tag. I have tried dragging and dropping without any success. Can anyone help?

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Problem Exporting Keywords in Lightroom 5

I recently converted from Lightroom 4 to 5. I just noticed that not all my keywords are exported to my jpeg file. For example I have the following keywords in Lightroom; Horizontal, Landscape, National Forest, Scenic. My exported jpeg has only the keyword Landscape.
In the Library Module, when I click on the dropdown Keyword Tags and select "Will Export", I only see the keyword Landscape. I'm not sure what this "feature" is all about. Can someone explain it to me. I need to be able to export all keywords.
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Thanks for your help. I really appreciate it. After checking some other keywords, I think this problem involves a minority of my keywords. I tracked the problem down to October 12, 2013. That was the day I installed Lightroom 5. Something must have happened in the catalog conversion.
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Thanks again!!!

Why can't I edit keyword tag icons?

2011-05-15 - For some reason, when I attempt to change the photo that appears in the keyword tag for a given person, the button for edit icon is grayed out. Anyone know why this is. Is my database corrupt?

Great! This is the solution I was looking for.
Just to clarify the method:
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Double click it in the organizer to open it on the one photo view
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Thanks Axel.

Problem dragging keyword tags in LR 3

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