An item can include one photo, multiple photos, or no photos. It is the primary unit of organization in Tropy. You can add metadata and tags to items individually or in bulk. You can add items to lists.
The item table is the center panel of the project view. When the slider on the panel is moved to the right, the item table turns into an item grid with thumbnails of your items.
The item view is where you take notes on individual items. You can also do basic photo editing and add or edit metadata. To access the item view, double-click on any item. To return to project view from the item view, click on the back arrow (<) at the top of the metadata pane on the left.
Lists are a group of photos selected from a project. This feature is useful if you want to collect photos and items related to a particular section of a project (a chapter of a book or thesis, or a section of an article). Photos and items can appear in more than one list. A link to the lists you create appears in the right pane of the project view.
Metadata is "data about data," or information recorded about objects, documents, and other items to help catalog, describe, and organize it. Metadata can include information about the content of an item, its location, its purpose, or any number of other descriptors. For more about metadata, see What is metadata and how do I use it?
The metadata pane appears on the righthand side of the project view, and on the lefthand side of the item view. It can be toggled to show the tags pane. The metadata pane is where you can see and record metadata about your items.
A project is a collection of photographs. You can only have one project open in Tropy at any given time, which means that you cannot move photos from one project to another within Tropy. For that reason, it usually makes sense to conceive of a project in broad terms: a project as a book or thesis, not a chapter. You can use lists, tags, and/or notes to organize material within a Tropy project.
The project view is the view that loads when you open Tropy. From the project view, you can view all your items, add metadata or tags, and manage lists and tags.
The sidebar is the lefthand panel in the project view. It includes the project name, a list of your lists, and a tag list.