XnView Software

Here are a few suggestions of IPTC dialog GUI changes that could speed up keyword annotation. The goal of all of these suggestions is to reduce the number of times that hands must move from the keyboard to the mouse by eliminating certain required mouse clicks. By reducing the number of keyboard<->mouse mode shifts, the work speed is greately improved

XnView already has gone a long way towards making the process of IPTC keyword annotation easy. I think these proposed changes will improve it even more. I am hoping that these are minor changes to the IPTC dialog GUI.

As a high level overview for keyword annotation here is what I do in my "outer loop" :

1) select a subset of images
2) Bring up the IPTC dialog and enter keywords that apply to that subset, then "write all selected".

Since my image subsets are overlapping, I have the "merge with existing data" box checked. So I select one subset, write keywords, then select another subset that might have overlapped with the first, write more keywords, etc... Periodically I also mouse to the "Clear" button so the wrong keywords are not annotated to the next subset.

Here is a "keylog" of all of the actions to complete a single iteration of the above outer loop. "MOUSE" is a mouse click and if that has a number in (parenthesis) attached then that number refers to a keyboard or default field focus replacement that I suggest to eliminate that mouse click. Sorry of the following keylog is boring and detailed !

a) MOUSE to select subset of images (these mouse clicks are OK and I do not propose any keyboard replacement)
b) ctrl-I to bring up the IPTC dialog
c) left-arrow to select the "keywords" tab
d) MOUSE(1) to bring focus to the keyword text entry field
e) type keyword
f) MOUSE(2) to click the "ADD" button
... repeat steps e,f for each keyword
g) MOUSE(3) to click "Write all selected"
h) MOUSE(4) to close IPTC dialog

Suggestions to eliminate MOUSE actions :

MOUSE(1) - when entering the keyword tab, default focus can be preset to the keyword entry text field. Current focus seems to be nowhere.
MOUSE(2) - use the "enter" key as a shortcut for the "ADD" button. This is natural.
MOUSE(3) and (4) - use some hotkey combo (maybe ctrl-enter ?) to do both "write all seleted" and "close dialog"

Maybe there are already keyboard replacements for MOUSE(1-4) that I just don't know about. If so I would appreciate being enlightened !

Regards,
Bart

I spoke (um ... typed ?) too soon. There actually is a keyboard equivalent of MOUSE(1) : you type TAB 11 times to get focus to the keyword text field.

Perhaps this keyword text field could be ordered earlier in the tab cycle. The current tab cycle takes me to many form fields that I rarely touch. Backwards tab is a little closer, if you BTAB 4 times, you land on the keyword text field. In my opinion, keyword text should be either the first TAB or BTAB.

Also I noticed that TABbing focus to the "Write" button allows me to hit "enter" on the keyboard instead of a mouse click. Perhaps this same method could be applied when TABbing focus to the "Add" button. It is the next stop in the TAB cycle from the keyword text field which is ideal ! That would take care of MOUSE(2) : allowing rapid keyword entry like : <type keyword>

This behavior is observed on a Windows XP OS.

I agree completely. As I (here) and many others in other threads already said the IPTC dialog is not very keyboard friendly, even though it really should. Even the hotkey-powered dll mentioned by clo in that thread did not solve the problem completely.

I guess this does not have a big priority with Pierre. Changing at least the tab sequence cannot be such a big deal...

Hoping for 2.0,
negg.[/url]