I will speak first with a few extreme counters to the seemingly conventional mantras here. By background, I am a moderate user, not a pro. I see DT as a tool offering the best options from two distinctly different approaches. You can bring Finder content to copy into its database and plan forever thereafter to be able to ignore the source content at the Finder (import). Or you can introduce a representation of Finder content into its database and prepare forever thereafter that you may have to keep track of what application did what to the content (index). The former treats DT as a fortress, where no one sees over the walls and everything that comes in or goes out is tightly regulated. The latter is an open commune, where everyone sees what everyone else is doing with everything.
My comments are as below.
I would import only when you have the fullest intent to take everything you just imported into DT, delete it from the Finder, and never plan to need to find those same files in the same places (folders) directly from the Finder.
I would never, when in doubt, trust to import first and index later. Rather bluntly, when in doubt, I would never trust to import or index. Rather, I’d read the friendly manual and map my use cases carefully to the pros and cons of each approach.
I would never import files that I intend to continue editing at the Finder level. I would index them.
I would never directly edit a file that is imported in DT and continue using the edited file as though it is the working version. I would create a copy of the file, rename the copy with a proper versioning system, and edit on the copy.
Before editing a file that is indexed in DT, I would take caution to assure that I am editing a version that is the most recent at the Finder level as well as within DT.
I can offer one example to use importing and indexing combined. Suppose that you have taught a course once a year over a span of a few decades. You have bunches and bunches (and bunches more) of files of various types assembled dutifully in “archive type” folders on the Finder organized with the folders named by course year. As it happens, you also have an active course this semester.
You’d like to write a textbook based on your course notes over the years. You know you have tons and tons (and even more tons) of duplicates and replicates and things that may be somewhat the same with just a few tweaks. You also have lots … of junk stuff.
Import all your prior year archived folders into DT. Create ZIP archives of each folder at the Finder level. Move the ZIP archives to an external SSD (the ZIP archive step could be optional if your SSD is large enough). Delete all the prior year folders from your internal SSD. From now on, work on the imported files only from within DT.
Index your current year folder into the same DT database into a clearly identified group from the others.
Now, go to town clearing out the clutter from the imported files, stripping down to the bare minimum of content. Realize that nothing you do to the imported files in DT will destroy the files that you stored safely as ZIP archives on your external SSD. Realize that you should be working on the imported files only to clear duplicates and replicates and files that should have been deleted ages ago. Perhaps you will also plan to use the AI tools in DT to assemble information from the imported files, creating a new document. Great! Store that new document within DT only when you expect that you will never want to access it from outside DT. Otherwise, export that new document to an organized location at the Finder level, delete the document in DT, and index the document back into DT. Agree that, if you ever make edits to files imported into DT, no one outside of your personal DT universe will ever see those changes. If you want someone else to see a document that was imported in DT and edited within DT, export the document back to the Finder level, rename the file with an updated version number, and go about sharing the renamed version.
In the meantime, also go to town updating the indexed files in this year’s folder, both from within DT as well as directly at the Finder level. Be happy that you can work on the indexed files within DT or using some Windows computer with remote access to those same files, and both places will (with some cautions) see the same thing, time and time again.
As for tags – your choice. Use them exhaustively. Don’t use them at all. But be well reasoned in why you will or will not use them. Otherwise, it is not the overwhelming abundance of or excessive absence of tags that kills good work, it is not knowing at the outset why you should or should not have them to improve your workflow habits. Do you use tags at the Finder level? What do you already know from this experience about why (or why not)?
In summary, I do not intend to strike fear and anxiety about using DT with my statements counter to seemingly conventional mantras. The example I gave about writing a textbook is indeed exactly on my roadmap for using DT. I have great expectations about the positive outcomes from this upcoming adventure. I hope instead to demarcate some clearer boundaries about why you should say YES or NO to certain practices. Sometimes, saying yes, especially doing so based on advice that says “when in doubt … do this”, can get you deep in thorn bushes rather quickly.
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JJW