Integration of a LIGHT TABLE function in XnView

[Danger_1]

It would be a outstanding feature in XnView to have a lighttable.

This feature should allow sorting pictures in a defined sequence
by drag'n'drop of the thumbnails on a virtual light-table.
After sorting the pictures it should allow serial renaming of the
pictures in the defined sequence.

This feature would allow to sort pictures like digital kamera pics
which have all similar names.

As far as I know, this feature is only provided by a few of programs
and so it would be a unique feature for a picture-manager like XnView.

[XnTriq]

• to move the mini pictures
• Rearranging pictures and saving new sequence
• Custom Sort for Thumbs! Exist in Xnview?

[JohnFredC]

This is one of my long-standing requests...

[xnview]

This is one of my long-standing requests...

For custom sort, some programs save sorted filename in a txt file on the same folder. I'm not sure that this solution is good??

[JohnFredC]

A text file may be a good (-enough) solution. A user could chose to store the "Light Table" layout(s) file local to the folder or in some centralized place.

One could implement a text file approach to establish the metadata structures required and address the functional need, then supercede the text files (maintaining backward compatibility) with an alternative approach sometime in the future.

There are issues related to centralized metadata vs. distributed metadata being discussed in other threads...

...but if we could reach agreement about central vs distributed, or a combination of the two, then a schema for maintaining "Light Table" layouts (or any other similar data structure) could be a result.

[JohnFredC]

A while back I cobbled together a utility in Delphi that gives me a crude light table function (and no, it isn't suitable for sharing... lots of crashes at memory limits, its just a skeleton, really) but here is a screen shot of what it looks like in action:



It displays all of the thumbs in a folder. The user can move the thumbs around with the mouse without limitation. This is helpful in identifying/matching components of panoramas (as demonstrated in the image) in preparation for sending them to a pano generator.

Very very useful to me, even in such a crude state.

Here is a copy and paste view as it might look in the XnView browser:



Functions (not implemented but) needed include:

Zoom light table
Load/Save light table
Add images
Delete images
Group images
Toggle filename display
Toggle file time display
Generate ordered file lists
Adjust thumb transparency
Etc.