How do I move a sub-folder up a level?

Posted on September 20, 2011 by Ludwig

Sometimes you need to re-organize your picture folders and may wish to move a sub-folder up so it is on par with other folders. Here is an illustration:

On the left the folder “Bob” is inside folder “Ann”. You can tell by the little arrowhead. In fact, until you expand (click on) folder Ann you cannot see folder Bob in the navigation pane.

To move it so it is on par with – at the same level as – folder Ann, proceed as follows: Drag the folder to the name of the folder where you want it. In this illustration we want folder Bob to be inside My Pictures. So it is dragged to the My Pictures folder name. Notice the little note (screen tip) that says “Move to My Pictures”. When it says the correct folder name, drop it (let go the mouse button). You have moved the folder.

You can use this procedure to move any folder to be inside any other folder, even inside sub-folders.

Sometimes the procedure will not succeed, such as when a folder is open in an application. Just close the application and try again.

You can reorganize your folders in the navigation pane of Windows Live Photo Gallery or in the navigation pane of Windows Explorer. (Do not have both open at the same time, see warning above.)

.:.

Technorati Tags: Windows Live Photo Gallery,Photo Gallery,Windows Explorer,folders,sub-folders in SkyDrive,re-organize folders,move folder.

Does the properties removal option in Windows Explorer remove all metadata?

Posted on April 10, 2011 by Ludwig

The option “Remove Properties and Personal Information” on the Details tab of Properties can be used to remove data. It does not remove all data. When the link is clicked another dialog “Remove Properties” opens with detail choices.

The options are: “Create a copy with all possible properties removed” and “Remove the following properties from this file:” The second option allows specific data to be selected for removal. In either case a copy of the file is produced. The new file will have a variety of the properties still in the file. For the example of a dogwood blossom photo used here to illustrate the process, a number of data items remained and can still be seen in Properties. Some other data that is not shown in properties also is still embedded in the file.

Do not rely on this tool to clear all metadata.

When I want pretty much all data removed, I open the photo in Paint, select all of the photo and copy (Ctrl-C) the selected area. I then paste it into a new Paint window and save the result. For just one or a few photos, that is a faster method than using a special tool.

References:

Metadata: There is more in your photos than meets the eye!

Metadata: Managing information with Windows Explorer

Metadata: Geotagging and More with Microsoft Pro Photo Tools

Set Photo Gallery to remove sensitive data from photos prior to uploading

Technorati Tags: Photography,digital pictures,digital images,metadata,Windows Explorer,geotagging,removing metadata

How can I see my SkyDrive photos in Windows Explorer?

Posted on October 26, 2010 by Ludwig

You Windows Live SkyDrive photos are stored “in the cloud” on Microsoft servers. Normally you access them through a browser like Internet Explorer.

It is possible to map a SkyDrive album to a drive letter in Windows Explorer. Then you can see what photos you have stored in that album.

NOTE: This method works in Windows 7. Windows Vista also supports mapping with this procedure, other operating system do not, sorry.

Here is how:

Obtain your Windows Live account “cid” number. Once you have that you may want to save it in a file for future use.

Sign in to you Windows Live account by going to home.live.com.
Click on profile underneath your name in the upper right.

The address in the browser address window contains your “cid” number. It is the number following “cid-“ up to the next period (“.”) as shown highlighted in this example:

Of course, the number will be your own unique number, not mine as shown here.

Copy this number for later use.
Get the name of the SkyDrive album that you wish to map.

Next proceed on your computer.

Click Start – Computer. Windows Explorer open showing your drives.
On the menu bar click Map network drive.

A “Map network drive” dialog opens.

Select the drive letter you wish to use. By default the selection is the highest drive letter available, normally Z:.
In the Folders box enter this text (without the quotes) “\\docs.live.net@SSL\” ,followed by your cid number, followed by a back-slash, followed by the album name.

Click Finish.

You will see a “Map Network Drive” dialog. It may take a while for this process to complete.

When the “Windows Security” dialog opens enter your Windows Live ID – the complete email address and your password.

After another delay a new Windows Explorer window opens showing your SkyDrive album (as illustrated here).

You can see thumbnails of your photos and you can see the properties of a selected photo in the properties pane.

Can you use this mapped folder like any other? Alas, at the present time (October 2010) when you drag a photo to this folder it seems to work at first. Then you get an error message.

The error message may say that the file is too large, regardless of how small it actually may be. Maybe soon Microsoft will enable the functionality that is so close to reality.

For now you will have to settle for just seeing your photos in the album. Use Windows Live Photo Gallery to upload photos to the album (see: How do I upload photos to SkyDrive using Windows Live Photo Gallery?) or upload from the SkyDrive side (see: How do I upload photos to SkyDrive?)

Technorati Tags: Windows Live,SkyDrive,Photos,albums,map drive,Windows Explorer,Photo Gallery

How do I upload photos to my SkyDrive?

Posted on October 26, 2010 by Ludwig

There are several ways to copy pictures to Windows Live SkyDrive. They can be “pushed” up using Windows Live Photo Gallery (see: How do I upload photos to SkyDrive using Windows Live Photo Gallery?) or they can be “pulled” up form SkyDrive. This second method is the topic of this post.

Here is a step-by-step procedure:

Sign in to your Windows Live account. Internet Explorer likely will remember you and sign you in when you go to home.live.com.
On your Windows Live home page click on Photos in the menu bar at the top.

Click on the album where you want to add photos. If the album does not show, click View all albums in the nav bar on the left.
Click Add photos on the menu bar.
The “Add photos” page provides for two ways to copy photos to the album. You can drag photos from a Windows Explorer windows, however, this method is not available on all browsers. The other way is to click “select photos from your computer”.

An “Open” dialog window opens. This is actually Windows Explorer. It likely will open to a document folder, so maneuver to the correct folder where the photos are.
Select the photos to upload in the normal way – click the thumbnail, hold down the Ctrl key to select more. The other ways work just fine.
Click Open (lower right).
The thumbnails will start to appear on the SkyDrive page. The default size of the photos to be uploaded is “Large (1600 px)”. If you wish the photos to be scaled to another size, or to maintain their original size, select the option by clicking the size button.
Click Continue (it will be unavailable until the “Open “task is completed.