ExifTool Forum

ExifTool => The "exiftool" Application => Topic started by: notmetadataguru on July 21, 2021, 05:16:41 PM

Title: Reading Metadata from Multiple File Parts
Post by: notmetadataguru on July 21, 2021, 05:16:41 PM
Hi,

I am wondering if exiftool has the capability of reading from multiple file parts. For example, I have a single large file that's split into multiple files. Could I supply exiftool with all of these file parts or is it only able to read from whole files? The reason I ask is because some of my files can be very large and it can take time to combine the individual files, so it would be great if I could shave off some processing time here.

BTW, love the forum and the app.
Title: Re: Reading Metadata from Multiple File Parts
Post by: Phil Harvey on July 21, 2021, 08:37:45 PM
Without knowing what type of file we are talking about here, all I can say is: Yes
Title: Re: Reading Metadata from Multiple File Parts
Post by: StarGeek on July 22, 2021, 12:33:16 AM
If the file is split at an arbitrary point, for example, a 2 gig video split in half with the linux split command, then I wouldn't think exiftool by itself could read it.  Though I would think maybe you could combine them with cat (?) and pipe the output through StdIn.
Title: Re: Reading Metadata from Multiple File Parts
Post by: Phil Harvey on July 22, 2021, 06:15:46 AM
Thanks StarGeek.  I wasn't thinking about splitting with the "split" command.  I was thinking about dividing a multi-page TIFF into separate pages or something like that.

Yes, the "cat" command would work for "split" files:

cat FILE1 FILE2 FILE3 FILE4 ... | exiftool -

- Phil
Title: Re: Reading Metadata from Multiple File Parts
Post by: notmetadataguru on July 22, 2021, 03:49:15 PM
Thanks Phil and StarGeek, this is exactly what we're doing but for very large video files, cat can be really slow. Thanks again for the replies.