Change Keywords Delimiter

[vbtrek]

I have just started using daminion, but would also still like to use windows live photo gallery for the rest of the family. Daminion writes Keywords with a delimiter of "|" whereas windows live photo gallery reads "/". How would I use ExifTool to covert from "|" to "/".

[Phil Harvey]

I'm afraid you'll have to be more specific.  Neither IPTC:Keywords nor XMP:Subject stores the delimiter.  The keywords are each stored separately in the metadata.  (See FAQ 17 for help on how to read/write these with ExifTool.)

Or are you talking about some other keywords tag?

- Phil

[StarGeek]

At the very basic level, the command would be something like:
ExifTool "-TAG<${TAG;s/\|/\//g}" FILE/DIR

But I suspect that it won't be as simple as that.  Daminion writes keywords to a variety of places (see the Metadata Mapping section here), and most of those places are saved as lists and don't need a delimiter.   Unless you mean a Hierarchical separator?  The different one in that group is XPKeywords, which I think uses the semicolon as a delimiter.   It's more likely that WLPG will read that.

You may have to check out FAQ 3 and figure out what the actual tags you need to look at are.

Another thing to realize is that what programs show you as a delimiter in their interface is not necessarily going to be the actual way the data is saved.

(ack, too slow with my post)

Edit: Forgot to escape the vertical bar

[vbtrek]

My apologies, I did mean the Hierarchical separator.

[StarGeek]

You will still need to figure exactly which tag you need to use.  I did find a post on an Adobe forum that mentions that Photo Gallery can read XMP:Subject as hierarchical, so check that.  And because XMP:Subject is a list type tag, you'll need to read the docs on the -Sep option. 

Your command would end up looking something like
ExifTool -Sep ", " "-XMP:Subject<${XMP:Subject;s/\|/\//g}" FILE/DIR
though if your data contains something like "Smith, John" or "Henry Jones, Jr.", you will want to change the -Sep option to something else.

[vbtrek]

If I have a heirarchy of:
Places -> Europe -> France
Special Occasions -> Weddings

And a photo that has both these tags assigned.

Windows Photo Gallery Tagged Photos (Descriptive Tags):
EXIF:XP Keywords = Places/Europe/France;Special Occasions/Weddings
XMP:Subject = Places/Europe/France;Special Occasions/Weddings
XMP:Last Keyword XMP = Places/Europe/France;Special Occasions/Weddings

Daminion Tagged Photos (Keywords):
EXIF:XP Keywords = Places|Europe|France;Special Occasions|Weddings
XMP:Subject = Places|Europe|France;Special Occasions|Weddings
XMP:Last Keyword XMP = Places|Europe|France;Special Occasions|Weddings
XMP:Last Keyword IPTC = Places|Europe|France;Special Occasions|Weddings
XMP:Hierarchical Subject = Places|Europe|France;Special Occasions|Weddings
XMP:Subject = Places|Europe|France;Special Occasions|Weddings
IPTC:Keywords = Places|Europe|France;Special Occasions|Weddings

My guess is that I only need to update EXIF:XP Keywords, XMP:Subject, XMP:Last Keyword XMP to replace | with / to keep the heirarchy looking correct in WLPG.

Thanks for all your help, it's much appreciated.

[Phil Harvey]

Right.  So using StarGeek's command and adding all the tags you want, the command would be:

ExifTool -Sep ", " "-XPKeywords<${XPKeywords;s/\|/\//g}" "-XMP:Subject<${XMP:Subject;s/\|/\//g}" "-XMP:LastKeywordXMP<${XMP:LastKeywordXMP;s/\|/\//g}" FILE/DIR

- Phil