Preserving File/Folder Colours across drives

re: File/folder labels

Did a search but couldn't see anything that applied to my problem.

I spent nearly 2 weeks colouring the folder names in my comics collection to indicate which folders were complete, which entry was a cross-reference, which were special collections, which comics magazines, which needed further checks/work, etc.

Then I chose to move everything to a new drive because I was getting occasional corrupt files on the old drive (years old).

They all moved successfully by drag and drop but all my work in colouring went to Hell. It didn't get preserved during the transfer.
Luckily, I calmed down before I sunk an axe through the system box and monitor.

I can't imagine what logic would justify dropping those settings as default. After all, they are all re-located on the same computer and I went to the trouble of setting it up !!!
Do I need to make a blood sacrifice or something to ensure that all my work is preserved in future ?????

(not a trick question)
:confused:

Thanks.

Please go to Preferences / Favorites and Recent / File and Folder Labels and see if anything is in the list there.

Also, what are the two checkboxes below the list set to?

Finally, over in Preferences / File Operations / Copy Attributes, is Copy metadata (comments, keywords, etc) on/off?

Hello, Leo

Thanks for your reply.

  1. Yes, the Preferences / Favorites and Recent / File and Folder Labels is full of colours as I created them.
    BUT
  2. The Preferences... Copy Attributes was not checked ! So that's the reason, presumably.
    (The moving used to work... could an upgrade have reset it?)
    Anyway, there's a sub-item under Copy metadata : "Copy all NFTS data streams" ... should I check that too? (the thing is, that if it's set on 1 drive, I want it to be preserved no matter where I move it on the same computer).
    I need to ask because the only "streams" I know have fish in them.

:slight_smile:

Don't change anything yet.

What are the two checkboxes below the list of labels set to?

This is how it was at the time I made this thread :

Thanks.

The labels in the list could be moved all-at-once by editing a config file, but as there are only 8 of them it's probably easier and safer to do it the normal way, by assigning labels in the new place.

I'm assuming those 8 labels weren't all of them, and the others are missing entirely?

A quick explanation of how labels work is needed:

[ul][li] When set to be stored in the file system (as they are by default and are in your screenshot), new labels will be stored with the files themselves if possible. (The main requirement is that the drive is NTFS and not FAT32 or a non-Windows network share). Those labels will move with the files but only if the destination drive can also take them (e.g. it has to be NTFS as well) and if the Copy Metadata (comments, keywords, etc.) option is on.
[/li]
[li] If not set to be stored in the file system, or if they can't be stored (e.g. because it's a FAT32 drive), the labels are stored in your actual Opus config. Those labels will not move with the files, and always point to a particular path rather than a particular file. (That has its advantages sometimes, so you can override how a label is stored, too.) (In older versions of Opus, this was the only way to store them.)[/li][/ul]

Only the second type of label will be listed in the Preferences window (since labels stored in the file system aren't part of your configuration, and Opus doesn't known about them until the folders they are in are actually read).

If there were other labels than the ones in the list, they will unfortunately be lost if the files were moved with the Copy Metadata option turned off, unless there's a backup of the folder/drive they were in which includes NTFS alternate data streams.

Hey, Leo

Many thanks for the explanation.
The 8 labels are all of them. No others.
So, the reason I lost all the settings is because :
• Copy Metadata (comments, keywords, etc.) option was off at the time of the move, so can't be recovered now for those moved files.
&
• It applies to move as well as copy.

All I can do is set Copy Metadata (comments, keywords, etc.) option to on now and re-do it all the individually files manually.
Right?
The big problem there isn't just changing the colour, which is done quickly... it's all the background investigation/checking against online sources to determine what folder is complete/incomplete, etc etc. I can't see myself facing all that again this year.
:frowning:

It's all on the one computer.
The 8 labels are already assigned to the computer.
They were only moved from one HDD internal drive to another.
:slight_smile:

I would humbly suggest that Copy Metadata (comments, keywords, etc.) be on as default ! Especially since the preference settings apply for the whole computer.

Do you mean they are all that's left, or that there were only ever 8 to begin with?

I mean that's all I ever created
:slight_smile:

Clarification : I defined 8 labels and applied them to 1,000 folders.

And the folders listed under "Labelled files and folders" are no longer on those C/Y drives. Been moved to other drives and no longer have those colours.

So it's not just these 8 that need re-creating.


In that case I don't think there is a way to get back the labels, unfortunately.