Features to help support image management software/process

[peterbaker]

First of all I would like to thank and congratulate the Coppermine development team for creating a great product. I have been using Coppermine in a limited role lately and have thought of a feature that seems to be spread across a couple of request threads.

I utilize Photool's iMatch photomanagement software (great and cheap). I have utilized both iMatch's builtin site builder function (good and flexible, just static) and also have checked out ks_bilder@yahoo.com's scripts (http://groups.yahoo.com/group/imatchuserforum/files/Scripts/) to integrate iMatch into Coppermine. Unfortunately I have not found a good way of getting images out of iMatch and into a web gallery.

What I am trying to acomplish is an efficient way of batching my photos into an online album. iMatch does a great job of creating categories (and virtual categories) and then placing data into the IPTC or EXIF fields. I have found a iMatch script to put category data into the photo's EXIF fields and a process of batching all the photo's into a single directory.

Ultimately I was invisioning a way were I could have a single directory that would have thousands of photos. This folder could easily be synchronised to the web site (e.g. rsync). That way I could cron all my work and when I put new photo's in iMatch and assign them to the proper categories, whamo, they are converted (raw to jpg, and rotated appropriately) and put up in a folder on the web server (in the middle of the night thanks to cron).

The next trick is where a feature upgrade to Coppermine could come in.

Feature Request*

• Obtain category information from EXIF information
• Allow single image to belong to many categories
• Incrementally batch upload files
• CLI or simple API (e.g. HTTP uri) to launch incremental import process
• Obtain meta data from EXIF (e.g. Title, Photographer, technical details (ISO,MM), permissions)

*These feature request list is in order of my perceived need.

Before I detail these out a bit, I would also be interested in helping code/test/document/whatever these features. I have limited experience with PHP, but I am a quick study Let me know if someone would be interested in chattin with me about this...

Obtain category information from EXIF information & Allow single image to belong to many categories
Given a image, read an EXIF field for categories and place the file into those categories. This would require a userdefined format for the field and probably the ability to select the field to use (maybe a regex).

Incrementally batch upload files
Given a folder in say CPG/albulms/batch, process only those files that have not been imported into CPG. Allow for process all files (imported previously or new) command. This directory could then utilize the EXIF features to assign categories.

Assumptions: All file names in CPG are unique? Original files reside in the batch folder. Detects incremental changes via filename & datestamp.

CLI or simple API (e.g. HTTP uri) to launch incremental import process
Basically launch the incremental batch upload process from cron.

Assumptions: Authentication is handled by being able to run the CLI or an argument in the http request

Obtain meta data from EXIF (e.g. Title, Photographer, technical details (ISO,MM), permissions)
Further EXIF processing where the details of the photo are stored in the EXIF data and imported during the batch upload


These feature would help with the iMatch use case. Not sure if this would be usable by other photo management software techniques, but I believe this is generic enough to work for many others as well.

Hope this helps. Please let me know if I can assist.

Take care and thanks again,
-Peter Baker

[Joachim Müller]

http://forum.coppermine-gallery.net/index.php?topic=9643.0
Some of the other features you request already exist in the devel version of coppermine.

Joachim

[peterbaker]

Thanks Joachim for the response and the link. This is the scripts I spoke of that KS_Bilder authored. Good stuff, but this is a process that will only work for iMatch. I am hoping that this could be redone in a manor that was not dependent on iMatch (and iMatch's SAX Basic language).

My main goal with the feature request is to provide a vendor neutral system for allowing dynamic category & batch importing into CPG. Automation is not easily obtainable with KS' script and it is a many step process that I have not had the best sucess with.

http://forum.coppermine-gallery.net/index.php?topic=9643.0
Some of the other features you request already exist in the devel version of coppermine.

Joachim