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Catalog Features
Catalog
or use View | Preferences | Catalog and then click 
. Once you have added folders to the Catalog, the program automatically goes through all the files in it and loads data based on the settings you’ve selected. The data loading process is indicated by a gear symbol in the Navigator next to the Catalog item. To adjust the loading settings, right-click on the line for any folder and then use these items:
Include Parent Keywords When Assigning Keywords – if your keywords have a hierarchical (“tree”) arrangement, you can use this feature to set whether adding a keyword that’s not at the top of the hierarchy should automatically also add the keywords above it.
- Sort subfolders by – use this to make ZS show subfolders in ascending or descending order.
- Catalog Preferences – opens the Catalog section of the Preferences.
- Update Catalog – updates a Catalog folder based on the rules you’ve set under Preferences | Catalog. The folder is first cataloged and then Catalog previews are automatically preloaded for it. Use the Full Performance item in the notification section (the bell icon) to let cataloging use up 100% of your PC’s power. However, this really does mean 100%, and so no other work can be done on a computer during preloading when Full Performance is active. To interrupt preloading, use Postpone, and to start it back up again after postponing, use Continue Preloading. If you don’t continue preloading manually, it is continued automatically on the day after it is postponed.
- Find missing files – this feature quickly catalogs files for searching. Unlike the Catalog Update, it does not generate thumbnails, and it is faster.
Right-clicking on a Catalog item gives you access to several items, one of which is named Show Folders’ File Counts. When this option is turned on, the number of indexed files, including those in subfolders, is shown for folders that are in the Catalog. This number may not match the item count shown in the Manager, because that count may be affected by functions such as display filtering, RAW+JPEG grouping, etc.
icon to the right of a folder’s name to turn on the Preload Previews option.
icon to open the Preview Preloading Settings.
Preview Preloading Settings
Use this window to set one of the different preloading modes for picture and video previews. Four modes are available for pictures – Do Not Preload, Quick Preview (with Low Resolution), 1:1 Quick Preview for Undeveloped, and 1:1 Quick Preview for All.
Fast Preview (with low resolution) indicates a preview JPEG with a resolution of 2048 pixels.
1:1 Fast Previews are JPEG previews with resolution corresponding to RAW. 1:1 Fast Previews for Undeveloped are only loaded for RAWs that have not yet seen any adjustments in the Develop module. 1:1 Fast Previews for All are loaded even for photos that have seen adjustments in the Develop module.
Three modes are available for videos – Do Not Preload, Preload Interactive Thumbnails, and Preload Smart Video Previews.
The term Interactive Thumbnails here means video thumbnails that change as you interact with them using the mouse. For every video, Zoner Studio creates 360 stills spaced evenly through the video that it displays if you run the mouse over the video’s thumbnail horizontally.
The term Smart Video Preview here means a preloaded video preview; this preview makes a file load faster into projects in the Video module.
If the Including subfolders option is not turned on, this preview option will only affect the given folder itself. Subfolders contained in a parent folder are preloaded based on default settings or their individual settings.
icon to see the time and date when previews were last loaded. The stopwatch icon means that loading is still only planned or in progress.
Because the Catalog stores thumbnails and metadata for your pictures, it’s the foundation for fast browsing when you’re in the Navigator’s Catalog section, and it is also the foundation for Quick Search.
Catalog Sections
The Catalog offers these sections:
- Folder View – a list of the folders that you’ve added to the Catalog. To work with your cataloged folder settings, visit Preferences | Catalog.
- Calendar View – here photos are sorted into virtual folders by the dates when they were taken.
- Keyword View – in this view, photos are sorted by keyword. Click and drag a keyword here to move it among categories. To turn a keyword into a category, drag at least one other keyword onto it. Click a keyword to view all of the pictures with that keyword. To assign keywords, drag and drop them onto your pictures. You can also tag pictures by dragging and dropping those pictures onto the keywords instead.
- Location View – in this view, photos with GPS data are sorted by the text description of their location into a four-level tree based on the following data: Country, State/Province, City, Place.
Quick Search
Press [Ctrl+F] or click the search box above the Navigator to activate Quick Search. This function is only available for files that have been added to the Catalog.
The Quick Search pane contains several controls:
- Text – enter the text to find here. Zoner Studio starts searching immediately once you begin typing. You can tell the program to Search in all text related to pictures, or in certain kinds only—e.g. keywords, the path to the file, its description or its location.
- Format – use this to set what file formats the files found by Quick Search should have: RAW, JPG, Video, and/or Other.
- Rating — use these controls for rating-based searches, in any of three modes: Equal To, Less Than, and Greater Than.
- Develop Adjustments – use this to search for files that do or do not contain adjustments.
- Label — use this to search based on one or more of the various colored Labels that you can give to photos.
- GPS — use this to find pictures by GPS coordinates. Use the buttons here to get coordinates from the selected picture, a different picture file, or a map. After setting the coordinates, set how far away from them Zoner should look, using the Radius.
- Including subfolders – use this option (available in the Browser only) to find pictures in both the current folder and its subfolders.
Click the button at the end of each row of Quick Search controls to return that row to factory settings. Combine multiple conditions to see only files that meet all of those conditions.
To add a folder to the Catalog, use the Add Folder command within Preferences | Catalog, or use Add Folder to Catalog in the right-click menu for a folder, e.g. This PC, or drag and drop the folder onto Folders in the Catalog.
More Information
[Infographic] How to Tag Your Photos With Keywords
A well-organized collection—the way to find any photo fast, any time
Metadata Updates
Metadata updates in Zoner Studio are a process in which the metadata of files stored in the Catalog is renewed, repaired, or synchronized. A photo file’s metadata is information inside of it that describes the photo’s dimensions, when it was taken, camera information, exposure settings, picture rotation, or other important details. Metadata updates are run whenever a new version brings a new, improved way of interpreting metadata that makes it necessary to re-read the metadata and re-verify its correctness.
The metadata information that is read is stored in the Catalog and the program’s cache. The program then uses it to enable the user to search through files, load them quickly, and display file information.
When the update process begins, the user is informed of this via a notification under the bell icon in the program’s top bar. The user can press a button in the notification to pause the metadata update process. If a metadata update is paused, it is unpaused automatically upon the next restart of the program.
Informational Flags
Indicates that the files are currently accessible but are in storage that may be inaccessible. The flag only appears in the Navigator panel on the left for folders that are on cloud storage (DropBox, OneDrive, Google Drive,…) and that have Preload previews set for offline use if the drive is connected.
Indicates that the file or folder is only available with an Internet connection and the data is not stored on this computer. The flag can appear in the left Navigator panel as well as on files and folders displayed in Explorer mode or through the Filmstrip. In the Navigator, you can find the flag for folders on Zonerama and Zoner Photo Cloud. In the Browser mode, you can find the symptom on files that are on external cloud storage (DropBox, OneDrive, Google Drive,…) and that are not downloaded to the local drive.
Indicates that the folder or file is on the disconnected disk. Any file with this flag is just a saved preview, not the actual file. The flag appears in the left Navigator panel as well as on files and folders in the Browser mode. In the Navigator, you can find it for folders in the Catalog that have Preload previews set for offline use if the drive is disconnected.
Signals a problem. The flag can appear in the left Navigator panel as well as in the Browser mode on individual files. In the Navigator, it will appear next to a folder in the Catalog that does not exist and which is also on the disk that is currently available. It will show up in Explorer for a file with the wrong extension.
If the icon appears next to a folder in the Catalog, the solution is to right-click the folder and select Change Folder Location in the Catalog. It is also possible to open the Options dialog | Catalog, find the problematic folder there, and click on the three dots icon, where the same option will appear.
If the icon appears next to a file in Explorer, the solution is to right-click the file and select Repair File Extension.