A question about version stacks

Started by sinus, November 23, 2015, 12:36:30 PM

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sinus

I have nothing as 24 images in the DB.

6 images are related, means 1 master (nef), 1 version (jpg), this are then 12 images.
12 images are not related.

Now I toggle (Ctrl Shift s) these related 12 images, on the screen I have now this, you can see it in the attachement 1.
The red lines is the colour, what we can choose in the preferences, for version stacks.
Each version stack is now toggled, means collapsed and we can see here, each relation stack has 2 images (the number on the left upper corner of the thumb).

My question:
Each time, if someting happens in this folder, for example I add a new file and IMatch scans the folder or I rename another file (if there would be more other files here), each time the toggled files are gone and theys are again untoggled.
You can see this in attachement 2.

I did nothing then adding one file into this folder (and afterwards made the window a bit smaller, that you can see the new file at the end of the images).

This means: each time something happens with the folder, all toggled versions will be untoggled. This, BTW, happens also, if the toggled versions are in a "normal stack" (that is it, where I have spotted this behaviour).

Is this behaviour normal and by design?

I have enabled in the preferences:

- Automatically refresh relations on
- Automatically propagate data from master to versions off

If we have, like here, only a handful of images, this is not a big problem. But if you have hundrets of images, and (like in my case) even toggled version into normal stacks, then this is a bit irritating.

If this is a bug, then I can write a bug-report, if this is nothing, what can be changed, then it is, like it is.  ;D





[attachment deleted by admin]
Best wishes from Switzerland! :-)
Markus

Mario

This should have been a bug report. Luckily I have this fixed already for the 5.5

Since this went unnoticed for so long, you can see how many users use version stacks. I think almost no user ever uses this.
-- Mario
IMatch Developer
Forum Administrator
http://www.photools.com  -  Contact & Support - Follow me on 𝕏 - Like photools.com on Facebook

sinus

Quote from: Mario on November 23, 2015, 01:07:17 PM
This should have been a bug report. Luckily I have this fixed already for the 5.5

Since this went unnoticed for so long, you can see how many users use version stacks. I think almost no user ever uses this.

Cool!

If this is the case, ALL my problems are solved, so please do not take out this possibility, like you wrote in the other thread. I am quite a bit shocked. Sorry for my postings, really (I knew it in a way) at the wrong time, since your head is full of other problems.

Thanks for this.
Best wishes from Switzerland! :-)
Markus

TomS

Quote from: Mario on November 23, 2015, 01:07:17 PM
Since this went unnoticed for so long, you can see how many users use version stacks. I think almost no user ever uses this.
Mario,

I'm very surprised by that statement. Version stacks and relations in general is one of the main reasons I'm considering using IMatch. It is functionality that is very difficult to find in any DAM software. I haven't gotten around to using it yet because I am performing some upgrades on my PC and want to wait until I've finished doing that before going back to IMatch and giving it a more thorough trial. I am impressed by the potential that IMatch offers for managing versions. After reading that section of the help manual, I realize that there is a tremendous amount of flexibility built in and it surprises me to hear that others don't use it frequently.

There are many options for software that enables me to add keywords and other core metadata and to search my catalog of images. I would not really need anything nearly as complex as IMatch if I didn't have many derivatives of many files. Do most users just use simple stacking as opposed to version stacks to manage derivatives or do most users not use stacking at all?

Mees Dekker

Mario

I certainly use version stacking a lot and had this same "problem" as Sinus.

Did not consider it important enough to submit a bug report. But nevertheless: I am very happy that it will be solved in 5.5

Mees

Mario

#5
Versioning and Stacking are features IMatch offers to users. You can keep things simple, or utilize it to the fullest extent. You can also shoot yourself into your own foot with versioning.

I know quite a lot of photographers who use a root folder (e.g. per month) and below that a folder for edits, finals, deliveries. They don't use versioning. But may use stacking while culling a studio day's worth of images (e.g. divide 12 portrait sessions into scenes with 10 images each).

Other users who work with RAW processors which creates external versions of files, or multiple finals in various formats and resolutions. They consider versioning in IMatch as indispensable. Still, they may not use version stacks. They may use versioning solely as a feature to ensure proper metadata propagation. Or as a way to quickly find all versions of an image.

Other users combine versioning with version stacks. And, like sinus, stack the versions into regular stacks as well, causing nested version and regular stacks. This can become very complicated quickly, not only from the user's perspective, but also from the development side.

It's just not feasible or economic to support or implement each possible feature for stacking and versioning. Sometimes I spend two weeks developing something and then learn a year later that an easy to reproduce bug severely limits  the functionality of that feature. And if no bug reports have been flied within that year, I also learn that nobody uses this specific feature, or at least not in a way that causes the problem to happen. Then I carefully think about updating the documentation, writing a knowledge base article or even removing the feature. It makes no sense to spend days or even weeks to develop, maintain, test and document features which are maybe used by a handful of users world-wide. In the same time I could implement five other features which are useful (and used!) by 50% of all users. That's a much better result.

Although I know my user base quite well after all these years, I don't claim I know everything. I keep an eye open for new trends in document management, and also look into other areas like big data, 'web-related features' and new technology like automatic classification of images or face recognition. Everything that allows IMatch users to manage their images and other files more efficiently, produce better 'results' and do more in less time.

That's also the key idea of the feature request board here in the community. Users who have an idea can post it there. Other users can like it to tell me that they would like to have that feature. Many feature requests don't get any likes at all, which automatically places them at the bottom of my list. Unless I think it's quick to do and that users will use it when it is there...
-- Mario
IMatch Developer
Forum Administrator
http://www.photools.com  -  Contact & Support - Follow me on 𝕏 - Like photools.com on Facebook

sinus

Quote from: Mees Dekker on November 23, 2015, 02:23:08 PM
Mario

I certainly use version stacking a lot and had this same "problem" as Sinus.

Did not consider it important enough to submit a bug report. But nevertheless: I am very happy that it will be solved in 5.5

Mees

Me too, Mees. This will a very good thing, what Mario has quickly solved for 5.5.
Version Stacking and maybe (for me) even more regular stacking is just a very fine thing.
Best wishes from Switzerland! :-)
Markus

ubacher

A note about users not using features:

There is a possible explanation for users not using features: Users may have tried a feature, not found it working to their satisfaction
(and not realizing that the cause was buggy behaviour) and thus given up on it.

Another reason my be that users still struggle to get a working set-up and not take/have the time to set up advanced features.

  ( I suspect most of the time it is a problem of understanding though and not bugs which may turn people off.)


Mario

Quote from: ubacher on November 23, 2015, 06:04:35 PM
A note about users not using features:

There is a possible explanation for users not using features: Users may have tried a feature, not found it working to their satisfaction
(and not realizing that the cause was buggy behaviour) and thus given up on it.

Another reason my be that users still struggle to get a working set-up and not take/have the time to set up advanced features.

  ( I suspect most of the time it is a problem of understanding though and not bugs which may turn people off.)
If you use this feature, why not write a short topic for the community FAQ? If you share how you use this, other users many think "This may be useful for me as well". I don't have the capacity to do all this on my own, unfortunately. And when users share their workflow, that's way better than anything I can write.
-- Mario
IMatch Developer
Forum Administrator
http://www.photools.com  -  Contact & Support - Follow me on 𝕏 - Like photools.com on Facebook