Keyword feature requests
jfriend
Registered Users Posts: 8,097 Major grins
As discussed in this thread: http://www.dgrin.com/showthread.php?t=13810&page=2&pp=10, I'm impressed with the possibilities for keywords, but find they don't quite solve my problems. So, here are some concrete feature suggestions to let more people get the power out of keywords and let us create more of the keyword UI ourselves.
1) Virtual galleries: Let me create a gallery that instead of uploading photos to it, I just specify a keyword query or queries that specify what keyworded photos from other galleries should display in this gallery. This would let me create pre-canned "views" of images based on keyword queries. By combining multiple keywords and/or combining multiple queries, I can create nearly any keyword view I want. For example, I could create a virtual gallery that lets my family see all the pictures of my son (across all galleries). The beauty of this presentation to the view is that it looks and acts just like a real gallery so there is no learning at all for the viewer. The account holder just specifies one or more keywords that automatically display in this virtual gallery.
2) Password protected galleries. Make it possible to use keywords with password protected galleries while still enforcing the password protection. I have to password protect most of my events because of child privacy concerns. I understand how this feature might be difficult and I'd be willing to live with some constraints (keyword queries only from a single gallery or some simplifying assumptions) to make this easier for you to implement.
3) Keyword groups. Allow me to group a set of keywords into a "keyword query group". For example, I could create a keyword group called "Grade Level" and then put the keywords "First Grade", "Second Grade", ... "Sixth Grade" into that group. This would allow various points in the user interface to display "Grade Level" and not all the individual grades. This gives the account holder some control over how keywords are arranged and presented (giving one level of hiearachy). Right now, my keyword box is just a long list of hundreds of keywords. This would let me control the keyword presenation and let me organize it into meaningful query sets. As you will see below, there are a bunch of other places we could use these keyword groups. When the user clicks on Grade level, they'd get a checkbox list of which keywords in that group they want to view, letting even grandma get the benefits of multiple keyword queries.
4) Gallery sub-views. Support a gallery option that automatically presents a list of the keywords just in that gallery letting the viewer easily select a subset of images from that gallery. This would be awesome for things like sports galleries. If the account holder keywords the photos by player name or number, then with no other work by the account holder, the viewer can easily view just the subset of images in that gallery that they want to see. Three big things that make this different than what we have today are:
a) This keyword list would be presented only in the specific gallery that it's enabled for.
b) It could be presented in a much easier to use fashion than today's keywords.
c) It's automatically scoped to the current gallery without the keyword user having to select two keywords with a "combine with" modifier.
Note that I could create nearly this same functionality with virtual galleries by just manually creating more virtual galleries and putting them in the same category as the main gallery, but automatic gallery subviews as described in this point make this an automatic feature that would be easy for lots of people to use without even trying (easier to user = more people use it and less support).
5) Keyword sub-categories. Let me assign one or more keyword groups (as described above) to categories or sub categories. What tihs would allow me to do is to create a keyword query interface. For example, if I had keyword groups named "Grade Level", "Act/Scene" and "Performer's Name", and I had assigned the keywords in those groups to the images in the Talent Show gallery, I could create an interface that looks like this:
2005 Talent Show (custom category)
--- All images in performance order (all the talent show images)
--- View by Act/Scene
Present List of Scenes (as defined by a group of keywords)
Viewer gets a view of just the images in their chosen scene
--- View by Grade Level
Present List of Grade Levels (as defined by a group of keywords)
Viewer gets a view of just the images of their chosen grade level
--- View by Performer
Present List of performers (as defined by a group of keywords)
Viewer gets a view of just the images of their chosen performer
If I selected one of the "View by" options, I'd be presented with a list of all the keywords in that keyword group. This would let my viewers view the talent show photos as a whole performance, select a specific act/scene, view all photos for a particular grade level or view all photos of a specific performer. All I'd have to do to make this possible is keyword the photos, create the keyword groups and select 3 groups for my top level category.
I'm sure this can be improved upon with more thought. Anyone else interested in this type of functionality? Other suggestions for how to improve it?
--John
1) Virtual galleries: Let me create a gallery that instead of uploading photos to it, I just specify a keyword query or queries that specify what keyworded photos from other galleries should display in this gallery. This would let me create pre-canned "views" of images based on keyword queries. By combining multiple keywords and/or combining multiple queries, I can create nearly any keyword view I want. For example, I could create a virtual gallery that lets my family see all the pictures of my son (across all galleries). The beauty of this presentation to the view is that it looks and acts just like a real gallery so there is no learning at all for the viewer. The account holder just specifies one or more keywords that automatically display in this virtual gallery.
2) Password protected galleries. Make it possible to use keywords with password protected galleries while still enforcing the password protection. I have to password protect most of my events because of child privacy concerns. I understand how this feature might be difficult and I'd be willing to live with some constraints (keyword queries only from a single gallery or some simplifying assumptions) to make this easier for you to implement.
3) Keyword groups. Allow me to group a set of keywords into a "keyword query group". For example, I could create a keyword group called "Grade Level" and then put the keywords "First Grade", "Second Grade", ... "Sixth Grade" into that group. This would allow various points in the user interface to display "Grade Level" and not all the individual grades. This gives the account holder some control over how keywords are arranged and presented (giving one level of hiearachy). Right now, my keyword box is just a long list of hundreds of keywords. This would let me control the keyword presenation and let me organize it into meaningful query sets. As you will see below, there are a bunch of other places we could use these keyword groups. When the user clicks on Grade level, they'd get a checkbox list of which keywords in that group they want to view, letting even grandma get the benefits of multiple keyword queries.
4) Gallery sub-views. Support a gallery option that automatically presents a list of the keywords just in that gallery letting the viewer easily select a subset of images from that gallery. This would be awesome for things like sports galleries. If the account holder keywords the photos by player name or number, then with no other work by the account holder, the viewer can easily view just the subset of images in that gallery that they want to see. Three big things that make this different than what we have today are:
a) This keyword list would be presented only in the specific gallery that it's enabled for.
b) It could be presented in a much easier to use fashion than today's keywords.
c) It's automatically scoped to the current gallery without the keyword user having to select two keywords with a "combine with" modifier.
Note that I could create nearly this same functionality with virtual galleries by just manually creating more virtual galleries and putting them in the same category as the main gallery, but automatic gallery subviews as described in this point make this an automatic feature that would be easy for lots of people to use without even trying (easier to user = more people use it and less support).
5) Keyword sub-categories. Let me assign one or more keyword groups (as described above) to categories or sub categories. What tihs would allow me to do is to create a keyword query interface. For example, if I had keyword groups named "Grade Level", "Act/Scene" and "Performer's Name", and I had assigned the keywords in those groups to the images in the Talent Show gallery, I could create an interface that looks like this:
2005 Talent Show (custom category)
--- All images in performance order (all the talent show images)
--- View by Act/Scene
Present List of Scenes (as defined by a group of keywords)
Viewer gets a view of just the images in their chosen scene
--- View by Grade Level
Present List of Grade Levels (as defined by a group of keywords)
Viewer gets a view of just the images of their chosen grade level
--- View by Performer
Present List of performers (as defined by a group of keywords)
Viewer gets a view of just the images of their chosen performer
If I selected one of the "View by" options, I'd be presented with a list of all the keywords in that keyword group. This would let my viewers view the talent show photos as a whole performance, select a specific act/scene, view all photos for a particular grade level or view all photos of a specific performer. All I'd have to do to make this possible is keyword the photos, create the keyword groups and select 3 groups for my top level category.
I'm sure this can be improved upon with more thought. Anyone else interested in this type of functionality? Other suggestions for how to improve it?
--John
--John
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Anyone care about any of this? Stupid ideas? Useful ideas? Not explained well? Too complicated. Nobody else cares? I tried to put some real thought into how to make keywords a ton more useful and powerful - just expecting someone to say something.
---John
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http://www.dgrin.com/showthread.php?t=13765
I'd LOVE to have #1, 'virtual galleries', implemented. One of the first obvious places I could see myself using it would be to create a virtual Best Of gallery that I could feature that would be all the shots scattered across my site that I really like and have keyworded as 'favorite' or something. You pros might have more/better uses.
#4, 'gallery sub-views', would also be great. If it could work in private/passworded albums then that would be awesome. I just don't know how you'd do the UI for this to not take up too much room, especially if it's a large/diverse album with many keywords.
I like the other ideas as well, but 1 and 4 would be far and away the best additions for me.
Zenfolio's Collections, for example, are basically an implementation of the "virtual galleries" concept cited here.
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John - I read this and used it for the basis of some discussions internally a while back - but I am very sorry for not acknowledging your post until now :uhoh
Please know - everything is read, and usually replied to - but somehow, we failied to reply to this one.
Thanks for taking the time to make such a thoughtful posting, it's really good stuff and gives us much to think think about in our discussions.
Cheers
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Steve
For example, I have created a "Rogues Gallery" as a potential entry-portal to my smugmug site:
http://home.houston.rr.com/pbolchover/index.html
(or http://home.houston.rr.com/pbolchover/index-small.html if you prefer smaller thumbnails)
One additional tweak I have found to be useful is to have the additional keywords "good" and "best". If I have enough photos of a person, then the Rogues Gallery defaults to showing only "good" photos of them. Likewise "best" gives an opportunity for me to showcase my personal favourites.
me too!
I'm fairly certain that the tags (same as keywords) on Fotki work in a password protected gallery.
Two comments about your approach.
First, you have to build your own HTML pages and find a place to host/present them. I'm asking Smugmug to offer this as a feature accessible to everyone, not just super power users.
Second, Smugmug's keywords don't work in password protected galleries. By definition my events all have to be password protected (it's the only way parents let me put anything online about their kids).
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