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──────────────────────────────── V : Log Professional Video Library Management ──────────────────────────────── ────── Search Operations ─────── Version 3 Copyright (C) 1988-1992 Sprenger Development All Rights Reserved ───────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── CONTENTS Topic Page ----- ---- Part I - OVERVIEW .................................. 2 Before You Continue ......................... 2 How Searches Work ........................... 2 The Parameters .............................. 3-4 Set Find and Find ........................... 5-6 Part II - THE SEARCH PROCESS ....................... 6 A Sample Search ............................. 6-8 Fine-Tuning The Search ...................... 8 The Second Sample Search .................... 8-10 Searching With Set Find and Find ............ 10 Search Tips ................................. 11 Page 1 - V:Log Searching ───────────────── Part I - OVERVIEW ───────────────── Before You Continue ───────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── The tutorial in this file assumes that you are already familiar with the operation of V:Log. You need to understand LOG files and PIK files, the File Selection Window, Reel Info, and a number of other pieces of information. Go through the tutorial in the text file "VLOG.DOC" before you try this tutorial! How Searches Work ───────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── One of the primary uses of V:Log is searching your LOG files to locate scenes fitting specific criteria. The description portion of each scene is searched for a word, group of words, etc. Search operations are begun by selecting "Parameters" in the Search Menu. Path: A:\ Mask: *.LOG String 1: Logic: IGNORE String 2: Case: MATCH Words: NO Find: OFF Set find Ask: YES In the Parameters, you set the drive and directory which you wish to search. You can search any existing drive and directory using DOS wildcards. After setting the "Path" and "Mask" parameters, you must set the other Parameters for your specific search. In a moment we'll look at each of those Parameters. When the Parameters are set properly, you will return to the Search Menu. When you select "Search", the search will begin. The name of the file being searched will appear on the Command Line as the search proceeds. When the search is completed, the results of the search will appear in the Editor. You can, at that point, scroll through the scenes and see whether they are the ones you need. If they are not, you can reset the Parameters and perform another search. If they are the scenes that you need, you have the option of saving them as a PIK file. You can also use any of the Editor commands and operations to move scenes, edit scenes, delete scenes, etc. Page 2 - V:Log Searching The Parameters ───────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── There are a number of settings in the Parameters. This is a double-edged sword: it gives you a great amount of power and flexibility in searching log files; on the other hand, it may seem complicated until you understand how the Parameters work. It may help to think of the Parameters in categories, or groups: The first two Parameters - "Path" and "Mask" - control which files will be searched and where they are located. Path: A:\ Mask: *.LOG The next three Parameters - "String 1", "Logic" and "String 2" - determine the text string or strings which will be searched for, and if more than one string, how they will be logically combined for the search. String 1: Logic: IGNORE String 2: The third group of Parameters - "Case" and "Words" - set conditions for how the search strings will be used. Case: MATCH Words: NO The fourth group - "Find", "Set find" and "Ask" - provide additional control over which files will be searched. "Find" and "Set find" are described in more detail, with an example, farther along in this file. "Ask" gives you the choice of deciding individually whether each file should be searched during the search process. Find: OFF Set find Ask: YES (NOTE: A more detailed description of each Parameter is given in the "REFERNCE.DOC" documentation file.) Path .................. Set the path (including drive name and subdirectory path) to search. The File Selection Window will appear. When the drive & directory that you wish to search are displayed, select a file and press [ENTER]. Page 3 - V:Log Searching Mask .................. Set a file mask to use in searches. For example, use "*.LOG" to search all "xxxxxxxx.LOG" files. String 1 .............. Enter the primary search string here. Logic ................. The "Logic" Parameter has four possible settings: AND, OR, NOT and IGNORE. This Parameter determines how the search will combine (or not combine) the two search strings during the search operation. In other words, String #1 AND String #2 will be searched for (scenes must contain both strings) ... String #1 OR String #2 will be looked for (scenes can contain either string) ... String #2 will be IGNOREd, and only String #1 will be searched for ... or a scene must contain String #1 and NOT contain String #2 (scenes which contain both strings will not be found). String 2 .............. Enter the secondary search string here to search for multiple strings in various logical combinations (see "Logic" above). Case .................. The "Case" Parameter determines whether the case (upper or lower) of the search strings will be taken into account during the search. The choices are "MATCH" upper & lower case or "IGNORE" the case. Words ................. If set to "YES", only whole words will be found. If "NO", the search strings can be found even if embedded inside other words. For example, if "cat" is the search string and "Words" is "NO", a scene containing "catalog" will be found (it contains the search string but not as a separate word). Set Find/Find ......... Use to limit the files which are searched, based on the Reel Info of the LOG files. See the next section for more information. Ask ................... If set to "YES", you will be asked to confirm each file before it is searched. Press [Y] to search the file, [N] to skip that file, and [ESC] to cancel the search operation. If this parameter is set to "NO", all files matching the Path, Mask and Set Find information will be searched automatically. Page 4 - V:Log Searching Set Find and Find ───────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── The two Parameters "Find" and "Set Find" can affect which files are searched. When the Find parameter is "ON", every file is examined before being searched. Only those files whose Reel Info match the Set Find information are searched. The Set Find information is entered into a window which is nearly identical to the Reel Info window. ┌──────────────────────────────────┐ │▒ID#:▒▒▒▒▒▒ │ │ Code: │ │ Project: │ │ Producer: │ │ Location: │ │ Client: │ │ Date: 00/00/00 IGNORE │ └──────────────────────────────────┘ For example, suppose you have 1O LOG files in the current directory. Five of those files have "John Doe" as the Producer in the Reel Info. The rest have "Jane Doe" as the Producer. For this search, you only want to search files which have John Doe as the Producer. │ Find: ON │ ────────────────────── │ Producer: John Doe │ │ │ │ │ │ file1 (Jane Doe) All files │ │───── file2 (John Doe) checked -------> │ │ file3 (Jane Doe) └──────────────── │───── file4 (John Doe) ┌──────────────── │ file5 (Jane Doe) These files │ │───── file6 (John Doe) searched ------> │ │ file7 (Jane Doe) ┌─────────┐ │───── file8 (John Doe) │ file2 │ │ file9 (Jane Doe) │ file4 │ │───── file10 (John Doe) │ file6 │ │ file8 │ │ file10 │ │ │ │ │ └─────────┘ With "John Doe" as the Producer in the Set Find window, and the "Find" parameter "ON", only the five matching files will be searched. Page 5 - V:Log Searching All Set Find information is used during a search (assuming, of course, that the "Find" Parameter is ON). If two or more categories in the Set Find window are filled in, all of those categories must match the Reel Info before a particular file will be searched. Any Set Find categories which you leave blank will be ignored. The comparisons between the Set Find information and the Reel Info are done using the current status of the "Case" and "Words" parameters. If the "Case" parameter is "YES", the upper/lower case of the Set Find strings must exactly match the corresponding Reel Info. If "NO", the case is ignored. If the "Words" parameter is "YES", the string "Jen" in Set Find will not be considered a match with "Jennifer" in the Reel Info, because "Jen" is not found as a whole word. If "Words" is "NO", however, the two would be a match and the file would be searched. The other Set Find categories - Reel #, Reel ID, Project, Location, Client - work the same way as the Producer category, with the exception of Date. As soon as you enter a date in the Set Find window, another window will pop up, asking whether you want to search files which are "BEFORE", "AFTER", "MATCH" or whether to "IGNORE" the date. ──────────────────────────── Part II - THE SEARCH PROCESS ──────────────────────────── A Sample Search ───────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── For this first search, we will search for all of the scenes in the sample files which contain closeups. First, set the "Path" parameter to the drive and directory which contains the V:Log sample files. The "Mask" parameter will, by default, be "*.LOG". Select the "String 1" Parameter. A window will appear into which you must type the first search string. Enter the standard abbreviation for closeup, "CU" (don't type the quotation marks). Because we are only going to search for a single string, leave the "String 2" Parameter alone. Leave the "Logic" Parameter set to IGNORE, so that the search will not try to find a second string. Page 6 - V:Log Searching The standard abbreviation for closeup, CU, is normally expressed in capital letters. To avoid any extraneous finds during the search, set the "Case" Parameter to MATCH. This will assure that any words which contain "cu", "Cu" or "cU" will be ignored. Our search string of "CU" must be matched exactly. The parameters should look like this: Path: A:\ Mask: *.LOG String 1: CU Logic: IGNORE String 2: Case: MATCH Words: NO Find: OFF Set Find Ask: NO The "Path" Parameter may be different, depending on the drive and directory where your sample files are located. Now that the parameters are set, press [ESC] to return to the Search Menu. To start searching, press the [S] key or select "Search" in the menu. In a few seconds, something similar to the following will appear in the Editor: 1 15:36:29:21 CU Terrier eating. 15:38:00:00 -00:01:30:09- V A1 015 VLtest 2 04:02:50:11 MS ZI to CU, yarn ball unwinding. 04:03:11:04 -00:00:20:23- V A2 001 VLtest 3 04:04:41:18 MCU mother cat chasing blue catnip toy. 04:05:01:10 -00:00:19:22- V A2 001 VLtest 4 04:05:30:00 Kitchen, CU food bowl, hand pours in cat food. 04:05:50:23 -00:00:20:23- V A2 001 VLtest 5 04:06:28:00 ECU empty food bowl, brown kitten licking sides. 04:07:43:28 -00:01:15:28- V A2 001 VLtest 6 04:08:11:00 TWO MINUTES OUT OF FOCUS. DON'T USE! 04:10:20:00 -00:02:09:00- V A2 001 VLtest 7 04:14:30:13 CU mother cat hisses, arches back. 04:14:50:00 -00:00:19:17- V A2 001 VLtest Notice that the file name on the right side of the Status Line has changed to the "PIK" file format. Page 7 - V:Log Searching One closeup is in the "DOGS" file. The "DOGS.LOG" file has a reel number of 015. The "CATS" file has six scenes containing "CU". On looking more closely at the scenes, we find one which contains "MCU" and one "ECU". That's reasonable; 'medium closeup' and 'extreme closeup' are variations on 'closeup'. However, in the next-to-last scene which was found, the only place where "CU" is found is in the word "FOCUS". 'Focus' has nothing to do with closeups. (At least, not semantically!) What can be done to narrow the focus of the search? Fine-Tuning The Search ───────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── In this case, something can be done. Return to the Parameters area and set the "Words" parameter to "YES". Perform another search. This setting of the "Words" parameter means that the search string must be a separate word (surrounded by spaces or punctuation) to be considered a 'find'. The scene containing the word "FOCUS" won't appear in the search results. However, the MCU and ECU won't appear either. You could find all of the types of closeups - and still get rid of that "FOCUS" scene - by adding a leading space to the search string (" CU") and setting the "Words" parameter back to "NO". The point is: a space is just another character when you are searching your files, as are punctuation marks and numerals. You can often use this to your advantage to find just the scenes you want. The Second Sample Search ───────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── Let's do a little more extensive searching of our sample files now. In keeping with the subject of the sample files, we will find all of the scenes which contain either the word 'cat' or the word 'dog'. Set the parameters as shown below: Path: A:\ Mask: *.LOG String 1: cat Logic: OR String 2: dog Case: IGNORE Words: NO Find: OFF Set find Ask: NO Page 8 - V:Log Searching This time the Logic parameter should be set to OR, because we want to find all scenes which contain either "cat" OR "dog". We will IGNORE the case. When you perform the search, the results will be similar to this: 1 15:17:49:13 Interview: Special treatment that the dogs get. 15:20:01:00 -00:02:11:17- V A1 015 VLtest 2 15:20:58:00 Tour of the pens, misc shots of the dogs. 15:23:27:21 -00:02:29:21- V A1 015 VLtest 3 15:23:27:21 Exercise area, misc shots of dogs. 15:28:11:11 -00:04:43:20- V A1 015 VLtest 4 15:28:11:11 The exercise area, more misc of dogs. 15:32:15:00 -00:04:03:19- V A1 015 VLtest 5 15:34:48:00 Truck shot, serving food to dogs. Chef supervises. 15:36:29:21 -00:01:41:21- V A1 015 VLtest 6 04:01:01:00 WS entire cat family, sleeping. 04:02:22:20 -00:01:21:20- V A2 001 VLtest 7 04:03:45:00 Cats sleeping again. 04:04:41:18 -00:00:56:18- V A2 001 VLtest 8 04:04:41:18 MCU mother cat chasing blue catnip toy. 04:05:01:10 -00:00:19:22- V A2 001 VLtest 9 04:05:01:10 WS Elizabeth getting cat food from shelf. 04:05:30:00 -00:00:28:20- V A2 001 VLtest 10 04:05:30:00 Kitchen, CU food bowl, hand pours in cat food. 04:05:50:23 -00:00:20:23- V A2 001 VLtest 11 04:05:50:23 Kitchen, MS food bowl, cats enter from all sides. 04:06:28:00 -00:00:37:07- V A2 001 VLtest 12 04:07:43:28 Front door opens, all cats emerge. 04:08:11:00 -00:00:27:02- V A2 001 VLtest 13 04:12:10:10 WS ZI mother cat in tree. 04:13:33:00 -00:01:22:20- V A2 001 VLtest 14 04:13:33:00 MS follow mother cat climbing down from tree. 04:13:59:29 -00:00:26:29- V A2 001 VLtest 15 04:14:10:00 Pan across to dog running toward tree. Shaky camera. 04:14:19:00 -00:00:09:00- V A2 001 VLtest 16 04:14:19:00 Mother cat steps in front of brown kitten. 04:14:30:13 -00:00:11:13- V A2 001 VLtest 17 04:14:30:13 CU mother cat hisses, arches back. 04:14:50:00 -00:00:19:17- V A2 001 VLtest 18 04:14:50:00 MS dog backs off ... nonchalantly. 04:17:09:09 -00:02:19:09- V A2 001 VLtest 19 04:17:09:09 Mother cat washing brown kitten beside tree. 04:17:23:00 -00:00:13:21- V A2 001 VLtest 20 04:20:29:20 All cats back asleep beside tree. 04:22:00:00 -00:01:30:10- V A2 001 VLtest Now an experiment with the Logic parameter. Go to the Parameters area, and change the Logic parameter to AND. Leave the other parameters as they are. In effect, what we are doing is searching for scenes which contain "cat" AND "dog". Perform another search. The new search results should be something like this: Page 9 - V:Log Searching We changed from finding 20 scenes, to finding NO scenes, just by changing the setting of the Logic parameter. Searching With Set Find and Find ───────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── To use Find and Set Find in a search, reset the Parameters to the previous state, when we found 20 scenes between the two main sample files. Path: A:\ Mask: *.LOG String 1: cat Logic: OR String 2: dog Case: IGNORE Words: NO Find: OFF Set find Ask: NO The "CATS" videotape was shot on 2/26/91. The "DOGS" tape was shot the month after: 3/2/91. We are going to use the "Set Find" Parameter to search only the more current of the two files. Select "Find" once, so that the "Find" status reads "ON". Select "Set Find". Go to the "Date" and enter "03/01/91" as the date. As soon as you finish, a sub- window will pop up, asking you to select "Before", "After", "Match" or "Ignore". Press the [A] key, for "After". This Set Find setting means that we will only search through files which are dated after March 1, 1991. Perform the search. Although the other Parameters are the same as before - when scenes were found in both files - this time only the "DOGS" file will be searched. Provided on the V:Log disk are some sample log files which were created to allow you to experiment with "Set Find". These 5 sample files are named "TEST0x.LOG", the 'x' being replaced by the digits 1-5. The Reel Info in these 5 files provides a wide range of names, locations, dates, etc. to let you experiment with various settings in Set Find. You can also experiment with the "Case" and "Words" parameters to see how they affect the "Set Find" comparisons during a search. Don't forget to try limiting a search to John or Jane Doe's files! Page 10 - V:Log Searching Search Tips ───────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── Be consistent in your terms. Don't use "closeup" in one scene and "CU" in another. If you used the term "flower" in one scene, don't call it a "gladiola" later on. This need for consistency also applies to the Reel Info. Use the names of your Producers, Projects, etc. consistently. If you ever want to find certain scenes in a single file, this can also be done with the Mask parameter. Enter the specific file name as the Mask parameter, with no wild card characters, and only that file will be searched. Page 11 - V:Log Searching