Finding files with unsaved metadata

[DavidVanZandt]

Is there a way to filter for files with unsaved metadata... or create a Smart Collection similar to "Without Keywords".  Trying to play catch-up with my keywords I'm often bouncing around between folders and forget to Ctrl-S my changes.  Other than highlighting "All Photographs" and saving the whole thing, is there a simpler way (other than relying on my so-called memory each time I make changes)?

[leuallen]

Is there a way to filter for files with unsaved metadata... or create a Smart Collection similar to "Without Keywords".  Trying to play catch-up with my keywords I'm often bouncing around between folders and forget to Ctrl-S my changes.  Other than highlighting "All Photographs" and saving the whole thing, is there a simpler way (other than relying on my so-called memory each time I make changes)?

Try figuring out this thrread.
link

[DavidVanZandt]

Try figuring out this thrread.
link

Thank you for the link above.

I thought Lightroom might run more efficiently for me if my metadata changes weren't writing all the time to my sidecar files while keywording, commenting, editing and otherwise updating metadata.  However more or less efficient Lightroom might run, if I don't manually highlight and ctrl-S my changes within each folder right after I make my changes, that efficiency is lost within my imperfect workflow.  I realize my mistake can be chalked up to "user error", but I suspect that others forget to manually save to xmp as well.  

It would be nice to go back and search for those files that need to have metadata written to the xmp files.  I don't know of a way to do that and, unfortunately, the link above describes incomplete methods of identifying only the files I need.  I understand that each file I'm looking for has the up or down arrow icon, but manually searching for these files is not easy to accomplish across several folders.

Does anyone know of a way to search the entire database for only the files that need metadata written to xmp files?  Though I would prefer not to, it seems as though with my imperfect workflow I ought to have "Automatically write change into XMP" checked in my Catalog Settings.

[Misirlou]

Couldn't you just select every photo in tha catalog, and write metadata for all of them? I've done that before.

[digitaldog]

The Contextual menu option to Sync Folders should do this and more.

[Wayne Fox]

One choice for a smart collection is recently modified ... settable by a number of hours if you choose.   Use this with a setting further back than your first change, select all of the resulting images, then hit save metadata to file.  Think this might get you want you want.

[DavidVanZandt]

One choice for a smart collection is recently modified ... settable by a number of hours if you choose.   Use this with a setting further back than your first change, select all of the resulting images, then hit save metadata to file.  Think this might get you want you want.

Thank you for this suggestion... and for the suggestions above as well.

After pretty much abandoning all hope of a simple search function I ended up selecting all my images and saving metadata whether needed or not.  That process merrily chugged along for quite some time... maybe an hour... long enough to get get some chores done at least.

I can now go back to my changes if need be with the "Recently Modified" smart collection.

I know the "Sync Folders" command  can identify and warn me about edits from external applications  to my RAW files (as indicated by the upward arrow icon) , but can you point me in the right direction to figure out in what context it could be used to show me only the files spanning over several folders where metadata has been changed within Lightroom and needs to be updated.  

Thanks again for all your help.  I really appreciate it.

DVZ