Galleries

A gallery is a folder of images with its own database: its own tags, saved searches, collections and relations. This is useful if you want images and tags to be completely separated, say art in one and family photos in another, and switch between them from the footer.

Galleries are managed under Settings -> Galleries. Adding one takes a name and a folder (on Docker, a folder you mounted into the container). You can also start a gallery from an export file, which fills it in one step; an export .zip, which carries the images, goes into an empty folder.

Switching galleries switches for everyone using this monbooru, not just your browser, and the default gallery comes back after a restart.

What a gallery indexes#

Everything under the gallery’s folder, subfolders included. Symlinked folders are followed too, so a gallery can pull in folders from another drive without moving anything.

A gallery inside another gallery’s folder keeps that folder to itself: the outer gallery stops indexing it.

Settings -> General -> Ignored files and folders lists what no gallery should index. It starts with the clutter NAS boxes, trash bins and snapshot tools leave behind (@eaDir, #recycle, .Trash-*…). A plain name is ignored wherever it appears (.* ignores every hidden file and folder), and a path with a / counts from the top of the gallery (photos/raw is just that one folder). Images the list newly covers are marked missing on the next sync, never deleted.

Delete removes the gallery’s database and thumbnails and leaves your files alone, unless you also tick the option to delete its folder.

Export#

Each gallery can be exported in three formats:

• db: a snapshot of the gallery’s database. The one to pick for a backup.
• json: the same content as one readable JSON file.
• light: a tags.json listing each image’s hash, path and tags, and nothing else. Handy as a tags-only backup or to feed other software.

Tick with images to get a .zip holding the export and every file in the gallery. Thumbnails are left out; they’re rebuilt on import.

Import#

Import takes anything Export made, or an export from another application (see Migrating). There are two modes:

• Merge adds what the upload has to the gallery. Images are matched by their content, so tags from the upload land on the images you already have. A .db or .json on its own brings tags only; new images come from a .zip that includes files.
• Replace wipes the gallery and loads the upload in its place, files included when the upload has them. You type the gallery’s name to confirm.

Entries whose file isn’t on disk still come in, tagged and marked missing; missing:true finds them.

Transfer#

To send a few images to another gallery without exporting anything, use Transfer, on an image’s page or in the batch bar. The image is copied over with its tags, rating, sources, notes and favorite, and lands in the other gallery’s inbox. If that gallery already has the same file, the two are merged instead. Relations and collections stay behind, since they point at images the other gallery may not have. Tick Remove from this gallery after transfer to move rather than copy.

Download#

To hand a set of images to someone, select them (or take the whole search) and use Download in the batch bar, or press d. Your browser saves one .zip of the original files, exactly as they are.

Include tags adds a tags.json in the light export’s format. Another monbooru can apply those tags to the same files: put the files in its gallery, sync, then import the tags.json.