Grouping Files

If you have to browse a lot of images in the File List you should consider using Group By to organize images into different groups. You may find it easier to find images when they are organized into groups. For example, if you use more than one camera, you can quickly organize your images according to the camera you used to capture the images. Similarly, if you save your images into different file formats you can quickly organize your images according to their file format.

Group By only works in the Thumbs, Thumbs + Details, Details, Tiles, and Icons views.

The Processed State group is particularly useful for finding images that you have developed, edited, or developed and edited.

To Group Files in the File List:

  1. Browse to the folder or folders containing your files.
  2. Do one of the following:
    • Click View | Group By and select a group option.
    • Click the Group drop-down and select a group option.

Grouping Files by Similarity

You can group files by how closely they resemble one another. Unlike the other group options, Similarity asks you to set how alike images must be before they're grouped together.

Similarity uses data from AI Image Similarity, so images that haven't been analyzed won't be grouped. For more information, see Using AI Image Similarity.

To Group Files by Similarity:

  1. Browse to the folder or folders containing your files.
  2. Do one of the following:
    • Click View | Group By | Similarity.
    • Click the Group drop-down list and select Similarity.
  3. In the AI Image Similarity dialog box, drag the slider between Less Similar and More Similar. The preview reports how your setting will group the files — for example, 177 images will be grouped into 67 groups.
  4. Click Group.

If the folder hasn't been analyzed yet, ACDSee Ultimate asks whether you want to analyze for AI Image Similarity first. If you decline, the dialog box still opens, but unanalyzed images aren't counted and the preview will usually report none. Select Do not ask again to skip the dialog box next time and use the sensitivity set in the options. To bring the prompt back, clear Do not prompt to set sensitivity each time on the AI Image Similarity page of the Options dialog box. For more information, see Setting the AI Image Similarity Options.

Navigating Through Groups in the File List

To Expand and Collapse Specific Groups:

Click the Expand or Collapse arrows, on the left side of the group header.

To Expand and Collapse All Groups:

Right-click a group header, and then select either Open All Groups or Close All Groups.

To Display a Preview of the Images in a Closed Group:

Hover your cursor over the group header.

To Scroll Through Multiple Groups:

Click the Next Group and Previous Group buttons at the bottom of the File List scroll bar.

To Display the Table of Contents:

Do one of the following:

  • Click View | Group By | Table of Contents.
  • Click the Group drop-down list and select Table of Contents.
  • At the bottom of the File List scroll bar, click the Table of Contents button.

To Quickly Jump to a Specific Group:

  1. Display the table of contents.
  2. Click the group that you want to display.

To Change the Sort Order of the Groups:

Do one of the following:

  • Click View | Group By and select either Group Forward or Group Backward.
  • Click the Group drop-down and select either Group Forward or Group Backward.

Removing Groups from the File List

To Remove a Group:

Do one of the following:

  • Click View | Group By | None.
  • Click the Group drop-down list and select None.

Selecting Files in One or More Groups

To Select Files in Groups:

Do one of the following:

  • Click the group header to select all of the files in that group.
  • Press and hold the Ctrl key and click two or more group headers to select all of the files in those groups.

See also: