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Like many others I am extreamily frustrated by Adobe Photoshop Elements 3 export features. The Organizer (only in Windows version) alows you to do some great management of collections of photos and of hierorical keywords. It starts out with multiple first level Keyword groups; People, Places and the like. Each of those top level keyword groups gets a unique icon. In each of those groups you can have more keyword groups or individual keywords. And these keywords can have thumbnails assigned to them. For example in my People master folder, which has a person icon, I have my imediate family as individual keywords; Wyatt, Daria, Gwendolyn and Lyle. I also have a hole bunch of sub folders; Geeks, Family - Troxell, Family - Sterlin, Family - Byrd, Wrights, UCSC, and many many more. Each of those folders has sub folders or indevidual keywords with thumbnails. So - now I can drag a person's keyword icon onto an image (or multiple) and assign the keyword to the photo. It is fantastic. Oh - and if I want to find all of the Photos of my son, I just click on the checkbox next to his keyword thumbnail... presto. And you can do that with any keyword or keyword group/folder. But there is a catch. After you get in the 12,000 photos and above range the application starts taking 30 seconds or more to assign a keyword to a photo. Being the Geek that I am I decided to try and get to the bottom of this.
I found that Photoshop Elements 3 uses an Access database file and ODBC to read and write to it. I don't think there is an easy way to make the app more efficent, but there might be one: you may be able to determin the ODBC name it is trying to use and hard code that to a better database... MS SQL for example. But this would probably be... well practically not possible. The route I went was "get far away from this app". But I want my data. So I opened up the Access file and tried to grock the relational structure. Big problem... I can find the groups and keywords and how the keywords are assigned to the groups/folders... all of that has fairly understandable relationships. The problem is that there are no references to the acutual photos. Well there are some, but none that map to any of the keywords. I think the app does something special with this album file that acces does not get... or I don't know access well enough to pull the data out.
Status: I can get the keyword structure from Access. I just need to do some exports and the throw it into a better database (open source). And I can have Photoshop Elements 3 Organizer write the keywords to any jpegs I have. (it can write exif data to jpgs, psds and tiffs). And then all I have to do is write a perl script, or some such, that will read in the exif and find the keywords in the hierctical keyword structure... I'm thinking a RubyOnRails app for viewing and such. But here is the rub. I have about 10,000 photos in Elements Organizer that are in RAW format, specifically Nicon Raw (NEF). PSE 3 Organizer can not write to NEF and will not even use the new Adobe RAW converter to go to NEG files. So the work around that I am planning: export all of my RAW files at JPEG. And do the grab thing I had planned. So.. that is my goal. I'll post my progress.... oh and my long time goal is to have all of my photos online as small files (max 800x800) and an easy way to add meta info to them and to get the RAW file. Yeah, that should be a breeze.
-lyleCurrent Mood:  annoyed |
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A while ago David Lawrence contacted KUSP and said that he wanted to speak with me about the name "GeekSpeak" and how I use it. I looked up his trademark on "GeekSpeak" and started to freekout.
My basic thought was that I would have to change the name of my show, and Geek Speak is a great name. Needles to say, I was bummed. I talk to David on the phone and he says he likes my show and doesn't want us to stop using the name. Whew.
So then today David asks me to be on his show. I'm on hold right now to go on air. Like many of my own guest I am a little nervus. |
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Marina Troxell, my sister, is loosing her kidney, this will be the 4th she has lost in her 29 years. Her husband, Chris, was going to donate one of his to her, but the last test came up positive for rejection. So it's a no-go. Chis has rejected Marina as well; they just filed for divorce. They have two small children, Ariana, 3 and Arora age 1. Chris says he just doesn't love Marina, maybe never did. And blam! Just like his father, he is off. And Marina is left alone with two kids and a masters degree in operatic voice, looking for a kidney and a way to support her children. |
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This is going on:
- Wyatt is growing rapidly and has new and interesting things to say daily. He is way into Bob the Builder.
- Gwendolyn is in that infant stage where she looks new and changed
twice a day. Unlike her brother, she is bigger then other babies at her
age; she is in the 95th percentile on the CDC Growth Charts.
- Daria is no longer being paid for work; and is working harder then
most. Being a full time mother is taxing. I respect and am in aww of her
more and more every day.
- My sister, Marina, is
living with her two girls in Georgia. Her husband Chris recently left
her and the kinds. On March 9th Chris is donating one of his kidneys to
Marina, who has had two such transplants in her life. She is currently
living on the kidney that Adriana,
our older sister, donated in 1993. Recently it was discovered that
Chris has an extra artery going to his right kidney; he has a genetic
mutation that makes him a better kidney donator then other humans. I
wish he had a better-husband gene too.
- My mother, Diana, has moved out of Santa Cruz to Cottonwood, CA. She will be help take care of Marina's kids during the transplant.
- My dad, Peter, died last year on the 17th of March, so for the whole family this is a hard time.
- The program I work for, DANM, is going strong and is very exciting to be a part of. It's also one of the most scattered jobs I have ever had.
- My birthday is coming up on the 19th, I'm throwing my self a LAN
party; last year, for my birthday, I incinerated my father's body.
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When I was in junior high school my father would type my papers for me. He didn't do the work for me - he simply typed what I had already written. He was a very fast typist. After high school and college and a move to southern California I started working as a web developer and programmer. During a visit from my parents, or was it me visiting them, my father noticed my typing. I remember him saying something to the effect that he didn't know that I could type - and that I looked fast. Until that moment I hadn't really realized it my self. It is said that we teach our children by example. I guess we learn things from our parents we are not aware of.
I just got back from watching Spider-Man 2. The movie got me thinking about my father. Hell I went to the movie alon... being alone brings up my father for me. The movie's theme is sacrifice for doing the right thing - and learning that some things you do not need to sacrifice. My father never told me what was right. He was not a preacher nor did he claim to have mystic answers. He didn't die some heroic death, but laid in bed for months until one morning, after I said good bye, he left. But, and I know it is horribly corny to say, my hero was and is my dad.
Dad, thank you for teaching me to be forgiving and understanding. Thank you for wanting me to be better and telling me when I disappointed you. Thank you for being such a wonderful man, your example has enabled me to be one.Current Mood:  nostalgic |
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lyle_troxell's journal