How To Best Manage?

Thanks for your question and for the outline of your application example. MLA can help you associate taxonomy terms such as “categories” in several different ways depending on the information contained I the image files and the method you use to upload them.

You wrote “the photos they upload are associated with the Dogs media category“. WordPress does not have a “media category” taxonomy. MLA adds taxonomy support to Media Library items and provides the “Att. Categories” taxonomy for your convenience. MLA can also add support for other taxonomies with the “Taxonomy Support” options on the Settings/Media Library Assistant General tab. Can you tell me which taxonomy you are using for your application?

One very common MLA application is to use the IPTC/EXIF metadata embedded in image files as a source for taxonomy terms. Do the image files in your application contain terms or keywords? If so, you can define a mapping rule to copy those values to taxonomy terms. Is that of interest?

You can assign terms to items as they are uploaded if you use the Media/Add New (Upload New Media) admin screen. MLA adds a “Bulk Edit Area” to that screen where you can specify terms to be assigned to items as they are uploaded. The “Bulk Edit Area” tab in the Help menu for that screen has more information. Would that work for your application?

MLA provides Quick and Bulk Edit areas on the Media/Assistant admin screen that you can use to assign terms to one or many items after they are uploaded. The “Bulk Actions” tab on the Help menu for that screen has more information. Would that be useful?

If you give me more details about your application and the upload process I can be more specific. I will leave this topic unresolved for now. Thanks for your interest in the plugin.

Hi David – Thank you for your prompt reply.

Thanks for clarifying the media category option not being inherit with default WP. There would be no expectation of IPTC/EXIF meta data. So we can’t map on this.

Will re-read the “Bulk Edit Area” docs.

“terms to items as they are uploaded” – Our objective is to to pre-define these terms or “Att. Categories” taxonomy and limit the uploads by the novice user ONLY to these based on post types. We want to sandbox that persons decisions.

We are looking at options related to Toolset and Roles plugins as well. Just didn’t know if the above logic was doable within this plugin.

Many Thanks

Thanks for your update with the additional information.

The “Toolset” components are a good choice to build on. I have worked with the vendor, OnTheGoSystems, for several years to maintain WPML support in MLA and they are good people. If you have problems or further questions regarding MLA and Toolset start a new topic and I will try to help.

You wrote “We want to sandbox that persons decisions.” You don’t say whether the upload process will take place in the WP Admin mode or in the “front end” of the site. The solution will be somewhat different depending on that choice.

If you’re willing to undertake some PHP coding you might find the many “hooks” (WP Actions and Filters) built in to MLA. Even if your uploads don’t contain metadata you can use the mapping hooks to implement your own logic for assigning terms to items. Of course, WordPress hooks are available as well but you may find some additional value in the MLA alternatives. You can find more information in the “MLA Custom Field and IPTC/EXIF Mapping Actions and Filters (Hooks)” section of the Settings/Media Library Assistant Documentation tab.

I am marking this topic resolved, but please update it or start a new topic if you have problems or further questions about MLA’s handling of taxonomies and uploads. Good luck with your application!