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Pro Photo Tools V2.0


rctaubert

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Pro Photo Tools has been a lifesaver for us. My wife and I are into genealogy and are collecting family photos. Our problem was how to share those photos with the rest of the family and ALL of the information about each photo. For our use I had an Excel spreadsheet which associated the information with the photo file name. That information could include the names of people in the photo, where it was taken and the date of the photo.

That information can be quite extensive.

Pro Photo Tools now allows us to store all of that information into the photo file itself. Now when we send someone a picture the information goes with it.

All the family member has to do is download Pro Photo Tools and they can read the info. However, there are some that want an even easier way to view the metadata.

If you have Windows Vista you can also view some of that information right in Windows Explorer. The Description field from PPTools is displayed as Tags in Explorer Details View. This is even better because it requires less from the family member.

HOWEVER, there is no Tags in Windows Explorer on Windows XP. I have read conflicting articles about how to fix this problem.

On said install Windows Search, didn't work.

Another said install Pro Photo Tools on XP, didn't work.

If anyone knows if there is a way to get XP to show Tags in Windows Explorer I would be forever grateful for that information.

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Not sure if this will work, but you view file metadata in Windows Explorer by rightclicking on a file, selecting Properties, and going to the Summary (XP) or Details (Vista) tab. You can also add metadata columns in Explorer when using the Details view. Otherwise I think your going to need 3rd party software, at least a shell extension.

Another method is to use an online photo album like Flikr, Photobucket, or Picasa Web Albums.

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Thank you for your response.

I tried what you suggested. That is basically the same thing you get when you place Windows Explorer in Detail View.

I did a comparison between XP and Vista (Ultimate) Windows Explorer. XP shows 48 metadata items. Vista shows 268 metadata items.

When Pro Photo Tool (PPT) v1 was first introduced I thought I remembered reading somewhere that in order to see the same metadata in XP Windows Explorer you had to install the latest Windows Desktop search. Unfortuneately I cannot find that piece of information again (if it even existed).

Window Photo Gallery (WPG) will show the information I am interested in. It even properly parses out the PPT Keywords (Tags in WPG) using the semi-colon. If you right-click on the photo image and then click properties it shows the PPT Description (Comments in WPG) but just like Picasa it cuts them off without any way to expand them.

Picasa 2 will show two pieces of the metadata I am interested in but in such a way as to make it practically useless.

Picasa2 will show what PPT calls Keywords (Picasa also calls them Keywords) but insists on separating it out into one word per Keyword. Where I put in each persons name separated by a semi-colon (Alfred E. Newman, Albert Einstein) Picasa shows them as "Alfred", "E", "Newman", "Albert", "Einstein"). In other words they use the space as the separater and don't offer an option to use anything else.

Picasa 2 will show what PPT calls Description (Picasa call them Captions), only displays what will fit in one line under the picture. Much of the information is cut-off. Hovering the mouse pointer over the Caption does not expand on it.

So, the main reason I posted here was the hope that someone knew if MS had created anything that would make XP Windows Explorer show the same metadata that Vista Windows Exporer does.

Thank you again for responding.

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I actually use XnView to view and browse image files. I probably supports every metadata format availible and is updated very frequently. The program is portable and a shell extension is availible:

http://pagesperso-orange.fr/pierre.g/xnvie...nloadwin32.html

Otherwise maybe look at Picasa 3 Beta:

http://picasa.google.com/support/bin/answer.py?answer=93773

Or Windows Live Photo Gallery:

http://download.live.com/photogallery

http://blogs.msdn.com/pix/

I didn't realize MS made an enhanced version of WPG which ships with Vista, available for XP too :)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_Live_Photo_Gallery

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