Why are there two Categories sections?

Thanks for your questions.

First, the two categories sections. You can see these in the ATTACHMENT DETAILS area of the Media Manager popup window or down the right-hand side of the Media/Edit Media admin screen.

The first section is labeled “Categories” and is for the taxonomy that WordPress creates and maintains for posts, pages and custom post types. You can add “Categories” support for attachments by going to the Settings/Media Library Assistant General tab and checking the box next to the “categories” taxonomy.

The second section is labeled “Att. Categories” and is for the custom taxonomy that MLA provides specifically for attachments. It works like the WordPress “Categories” taxonomy but having a separate taxonomy for attachments avoids some problems and is preferred by most MLA users.

WordPress Categories and Tags go way back to the early days of WordPress and have always been reserved for Posts and Pages. There is a lot of code in WordPress that specifically excludes attachments when searching Categories and Tags.

WordPress introduced Custom Taxonomies in version 3.0, and the “Att. Categories” and “Att. Tags” taxonomies provided by MLA use the WordPress Custom Taxonomy features. MLA supports both its own taxonomies and the built-in WordPress taxonomies so you can make the best choice for your application.

You have two ways to use bulk actions to assign taxonomy terms to your attachments:

1. You can use the “Bulk Edit” area of the Media/Assistant submenu table.
2. You can use the IPTC/EXIF mapping rules to automatically assign terms based on data embedded in JPG and TIFF image files.

Here are links to several earlier topics that discuss different aspects of taxonomy use, Bulk Edit and IPTC/EXIF mapping:

Bulk Edit to define the Att. Category

Question for Media Library Assistant users

Help With Mapping For The Stupid

Nothing works ??

How do I assign all images in posts to the post’s categories?

I hope that answers your immediate questions. I am marking this topic resolved, but please update it or start another topic if you have specific questions about using taxonomies in your application. Thanks for you interest in the plugin.