Duplicate existing collection to Publish Services?

[becksnyc]

Lightroom Version Number

LrC 12.2

Operating System

1. Windows 10

I have extensive SETS of smart collections for species ID. Can these sets be duplicated as Published collection sets without re-creating the entire structure?
If not, can SETS of regular collections be duplicated as Published collection sets?

I've downloaded Friedl's Collection Publisher, but am not certain what is possible using it?

Thanks

 

[clee01l]

You can create a Smart Publish Service with the criteria {Collection}{Contains}{[Your Smart Collection}

 

[David_W]

I've downloaded Friedl's Collection Publisher, but am not certain what is possible using it?

Jeffrey's Collection Publisher plugin gives you a publish service that allows you to publish collections into a folder hierarchy. The mirror functionality can be fragile but is worth testing in your scenario. If all your species smart collections are in a "Species" collection set, then you should be able to mirror that collection set to export all the images in a folder hierarchy matching your collection hierarchy.

 

[becksnyc]

You can create a Smart Publish Service with the criteria {Collection}{Contains}{[Your Smart Collection}

Thank you, Mr. Lee.

 

[becksnyc]

Jeffrey's Collection Publisher plugin gives you a publish service that allows you to publish collections into a folder hierarchy. The mirror functionality can be fragile but is worth testing in your scenario. If all your species smart collections are in a "Species" collection set, then you should be able to mirror that collection set to export all the images in a folder hierarchy matching your collection hierarchy.

Yeah, I saw that term "fragile" on his info page & it set me to quivering.
I just spent a month testing & creating collections in LrC to sync with Lightroom Mobile only to find keywords aren't searchable in locally stored collections. (I need offline access in my rural field work).
Every time I go to set up this much needed system of exporting collections via Friedl's plugin, my eyes just glaze over. Maybe I need to hire tech support.

 

[Johan Elzenga]

You can create a Smart Publish Service with the criteria {Collection}{Contains}{[Your Smart Collection}

I don’t think you can do that, unless smart collections in a publishing service are different. A regular smart collection can search for images in a normal collection, but not for images in another smart collection.

 

[David_W]

Yeah, I saw that term "fragile" on his info page & it set me to quivering.

In this case, the risks should be very low - the worst that should happen is that it will fail to work as you hope. For extra safety, ensure you have a couple of good backups of your Lightroom catalog before proceeding.

The fragility is more that the plugin might malfunction because it is doing things that the Lightroom Classic plugin API was not really intended to do.

Every time I go to set up this much needed system of exporting collections via Friedl's plugin, my eyes just glaze over. Maybe I need to hire tech support.

Like many of Jeffrey's plugins, the configuration options look daunting. However, the number of options is because of the power. Typically, a handful of well-chosen settings will get you going. Perhaps the most awkward plugin of his to get going is the excellent geotagging one, and that is only because of the lengthy process of obtaining a Google API key (understandably Jeffrey will not pay the Google charges incurred by use of a donationware plugin).

So long as you have all the collections you wish to export under a single collection set, I would configure Collection Publisher by specifying a folder you want the images exported into, then follow the mirror instructions. Set the export options and that should be all you need to get things going. I would leave all the other options alone until you see how well it works.

If you aren't happy with what happens, you can always delete the publish settings, wipe the folder of exported images and try again.

 

[johnbeardy]

The fragility is more that the plugin might malfunction because it is doing things that the Lightroom Classic plugin API was not really intended to do.

That's right, because the publish plugin will assume that collections and photos are added normally, not by another plugin, and it may respond unpredictably.

So for example, whenever the user creates a new published collection, the publish plugin might require extra information to be entered before it sets up the collection online and gets back data such as its ID or other server-side details to record locally. If another plugin is setting up the collections, it could interfere with processes like this.

Look out for odd error messages and things not working right, but try it anyway - it may work.

 

[becksnyc]

In this case, the risks should be very low - the worst that should happen is that it will fail to work as you hope. For extra safety, ensure you have a couple of good backups of your Lightroom catalog before proceeding.

The fragility is more that the plugin might malfunction because it is doing things that the Lightroom Classic plugin API was not really intended to do.


Like many of Jeffrey's plugins, the configuration options look daunting. However, the number of options is because of the power. Typically, a handful of well-chosen settings will get you going. Perhaps the most awkward plugin of his to get going is the excellent geotagging one, and that is only because of the lengthy process of obtaining a Google API key (understandably Jeffrey will not pay the Google charges incurred by use of a donationware plugin).

So long as you have all the collections you wish to export under a single collection set, I would configure Collection Publisher by specifying a folder you want the images exported into, then follow the mirror instructions. Set the export options and that should be all you need to get things going. I would leave all the other options alone until you see how well it works.

If you aren't happy with what happens, you can always delete the publish settings, wipe the folder of exported images and try again.

When you say "a single collection set," does that eliminate the possibility of mirroring sets within sets?
For example, I have a set "Plants of (my state in US)"
Inside that are sets of Monocots & Dicots.
Inside Monocots are the smart collections of plant families (I don't currently intend to go any further).
It's easy enough for me to plop all the plants smart collections into one folder, if needed.
Thanks for the detailed help & encouragement.