Hi,
I’m wondering whether commas could be supported in the tagging structure as I have a list of authors that I structure by “last name, first name.” Each time I try to add the name of an author as listed, it breaks it up at the comma, so I have two tags going “Last name”, “First name”.
So I’m hoping this could be changed. Thanks!
The comma and semicolon are used to simplify entering multiple tags. You can of course use other characters in the way you mention – such as last/first or last-first or last:first.
After all, the comma in last,first is just a typographical convention with no semantic meaning, so some other character can have the same typographical meaning.
This is due to a change in the latest versions of macOS.
OK, I understood that. Do you have a script to convert my thousans of old tags “lastname, firstname” to “lastname-firstname”?
I’m sorry to be a downer, but there really has to be a better way as my tags are currently a mess with many duplicates that I cannot seem to find a way to merge.
And with the use of commas, I understand that using a comma is just a convention in the specific case of using it for organizing authors based on last names, but I also have other reasons for the use of commas, i.e. when they’re used for book titles, “Human, All Too Human.”
I’m really hoping that there can be a better solution as I am afraid that I will have to go back to using ver.2 as a neat, organizational structure is paramount for me.
Perhaps using the existing or custom metadata fields in DT3 are more appropriate than using tags to store static info such as book name, author, and published year, etc.? You can still using smart groups/rule to group or manipulate those items with the same metadata. However, if you need a comprehensive descriptive stat of those metadata fields you’ll need to export the metadata and do it via other methods such as using pivot table in Excel.
While the switch of using the comma as the delimiter of tags is a MacOS thing, perhaps DT3 can consider offering some sort of script/utility to help DT2 users to convert commas in tags to another symbol for the transition. Or better yet, if users have a tag tree in place (such as many year tags under a parent tag of “year” or many author names under a parent tag of “Author”), a script/utility to extract those tags into an existing/newly created metadata field.
I appreciate the suggestion, but assuming that metadata is what I only use the tagging structure doesn’t sufficiently describe the way that I have been using tags. I’m just providing examples of where it currently has failed. I can show you my list of tags, but it’s too long to show.
With the new version, I’m feeling more limited because DT now uses macOS’s tagging structure, which means no longer can use spaces between words, can’t use commas as previously stated, and there are duplicates that I cannot merge.
This isn’t good for people who use DT for the very purpose of maintaining and organized filing system.
Just FYI: AFAIMA u can still use space or any symbol, just not comma.
Oops, I stand corrected on that note.
with many duplicates that I cannot seem to find a way to merge.
Duplicates where - in the Tags of the same database?
I think there will always be quite some manual work in cleaning up the tags such as moving items from duplicated tags to one tag, etc. It seems an unavoidable task.
Just a reminder: In DT3b3, If you drag and drop items from one tag to another, it won’t “move” the items but will create replicants to another tag. According to the developer, in the next beta some key combining with drag will execute move instead of creating replicants.
Unfortunately, global tags are not a feature of DT3 so we may have to be careful to avoid messing up the assignment of tags…
This wasn’t an issue in DT2.
It’s unclear from the screen capture: Are these showing the global Tags group, i.e., all the tags from all the open databases, and the tags are in separate databases?
This is under the tags of one of my databases.
Here’s a screenshot highlighting the specific database and where the tags from the previous screenshot fall under:
Currently, you cannot make multiple selections in the Navigate sidebar. But you certainly can in the item list…
Thanks for this tips. I used to stupidly move items from one tag to another!
You’re welcome. Do note the top item is preserved, e.g., in my example the 175120 Tag would remain.
Nice! Thank you Jim!!
