Photo management tool

Andy* just blogged about wanting a open source photo management tool. This is something i’ve had on the back burner for a long time. I think he wants one that is more like a client application, and my needs are more in-line with a client/server/web-app setup. This is because i like to have all my photos on my server, accessible from anywhere, easily backed-up, and all the other good stuff you get from having them on a server in the basement.

The last time i went looking for something was like this, the only thing that came close to fitting the bill was Photos. It was missing some key features, like the ability to ‘tag’ photos a-la del.icio.us, and that it was programmed in PHP. Also the fact that it hasn’t been updated in about 2 years is a bummer.

I’ve made several starts at building a backend for this mythical tool. What i’m going to do is to start a list of features that this tool should be able to do. I’d like to state also the things it is not going to do:

• It is not an image gallery tool. Via plugins or extensions we could create the ability to upload to various gallery tools (flickr, etc).
• Not an image editor. (i might relax this one, including really basic functionality, like image rotation and croping)

Now, the core set of functions that it would need:

• Support JPGs (other file formats to follow)
• Browsing via Physical structure on the server, tags, meta-data, etc. (tree view)
• Display of images at different sizes (thumbnails, etc)
• Suport for adding/reading photo meta-data in EXIF and IPTC - python lib and example
• Generic Tagging of photos (via Tasty?)
• Search via tag, meta-data, etc
• Basic security (https? digest mode? other?)

Once that is working, there is an almost endless list of things that would be nice-to-haves.

• Collections of arbitrary photos (this could be used in conjunction with the gallery upload extension/plugin)
• Image import/upload via the tool
• etc

Updates as i think of them.

This sounds like a potentially good way to go too - split each bit of functionality off into its own “app”. This is by the guy that wrote the Tasty tagging app.

(*) As if i actually know this person - i just read his blog, and have created this mythical world where i can call him by his first name as if i knew him personally. Ah the internet, crushing good manners since 1994!