Metadata Terms represent a powerful tool in streamlining and systematizing an organization’s use of metadata. By defining Metadata Terms for any Project or folder, or for the entire DF Studio Library, admin users can determine which terms are available via type-ahead functionality within the metadata editor at that location.

Assigning Metadata Terms to the appropriate Projects and folders provides many benefits: it puts an end to typing the same information repeatedly for individual files; it helps prevent mismatched information, misspellings, or typographical errors; and it provides a controlled metadata vocabulary based upon known information (such as the names of talent featured in certain seasons of a television show, or a standardized set of keywords for interfacing with the parameters of an external asset-management application).

When Metadata Terms have been defined for a specific field, those terms will appear as a type-ahead suggestion when users begin to input text into the metadata editor for that field. This makes it faster to enter values from the defined Metadata Terms when editing. If a user adds a new value to the field, it will also be added to the defined Metadata Terms.

Assign Metadata Terms

Metadata Terms can be assigned to any level of hierarchy within the Library, from the Library folder itself (which contains all other folders, Projects, and Collections), to any individual folder or Project. Metadata Terms defined at any level of hierarchy are inherited by items included below that level. (For example, if “modern” is added to the Metadata Terms in the “Cities” folder, and Projects “Berlin”, “Rome”, and “New York” are stored in that folder, “modern” will appear in the metadata editor for each of those three Projects.)

Define the Metadata Terms for an individual Project or folder using the following steps:

1. Navigate to the appropriate Project or folder.

To navigate to the Library folder, click the Library tab, and then click the Library icon from the navigation path to move to the top of the hierarchy.

2. Click the “Manage Metadata Terms” button in the Project Inspector or Folder Inspector.

Users without Admin access or Write Metadata permission will only see the “Manage Metadata Terms” button on Projects, not folders. For more information, see Control Access With Permissions Settings.

3. Click to open the desired metadata field.

4. Click to open the desired levels of hierarchy for assigning Metadata Terms. Terms for multiple levels of hierarchy can be managed in the same operation. (Users without Admin access will have read-only access to all levels except the current Project.)

Since each Project or folder inherits the Metadata Terms assigned to the folders above it, it is not necessary to place the same term in more than one location.

5. Add, edit, or remove Metadata Terms as desired and click “Save” to commit the changes.

The Manage Metadata Terms overlay does not support managing more than 5000 terms at any single level of hierarchy. Contact DF Studio support for assistance with larger sets of terms.

Create Custom Metadata Fields

By default, the metadata fields Keywords, Photographer, and Client are configured with attached Metadata Terms, which can be populated and edited by DF Studio users. Enterprise customers may also contact DF Studio support staff to configure additional fields based on Metadata Terms, customize the way Metadata Terms are presented (list vs. type-ahead), or specify how new values are stored into Metadata Terms when entered into the metadata editor.

For more information about using the metadata editor to assign values to a field with defined Metadata Terms, see Assign Metadata Using Metadata Terms.