Working with Catalog

About Scanning Disk Images

ReportCD is cataloging software, it means that it can catalog the contents of disks and other media, and store them in a catalog file for later offline access and searching.

In order to do that, ReportCD scans the media, reads the folder structure, optionnaly imports information from files (such as description or thumbnail). The plugins used by ReportCD (and loaded at startup) are used to extract information from scanned files : for example, a plugin can extract properties of a movie file, extract thumbnail for a picture file,... The plugins can activated one by one before scanning a media, in the options window.

Warning : Activating all plugins can considerably increase the time to scan a media, and increase the size of the catalog file.

Working with catalog

• Selecting the view catalog: To view the content of the catalog, select the view Catalog by clicking on View | Catalog. This is the default view when ReportCD is launched.
• Creating a new catalog: To create a new catalog, select File | New. By default, ReportCD creates a new catalog. To save it, click on File | Save
• Scanning disk images: To add a new disk, select Action | Scan. Use the dialog that appears to locate and select the desired disk. In this dialog, you will find several options :
  • Detect if a new media is insterted : Use this option to automatically refresh the dialog when a media is inserted or ejected (like CD-ROM or DVD-ROM)
  • Format disk name & description : Set to upper case each word
  • Calculate the number of files to scan : If checked, this option will first calculate the number of files in order to indicate the progression of the scan. If the disk to scan has a lot a files, unchecking this option can reduce the time to scan the media.
  • Auto save the catalog after each scan : The system will save the catalog when the scan of the disk is finished. It can avoid to loose data when scanning a lot a disks.
  • Eject media when finished : The system will eject the disk after the scan. This option can be useful when scanning a lot DVDs for example.
• Navigating in the catalog collection: The user interface is divided in 3 parts
  • Tree window : In this part, you will find catalog, disks & folders hierarchically organized.
  • List window : On the right side, the list window display contents of currently selected item in the Tree Window. For example, if a folder is selected in the left pane, this window will show files & folders stored in selected folder.
  • Properties window : In this window, you will find the properties of the file or folder, which is selected in the list window.

Import/Export disk collection

ReportCD can export data in 2 formats :

• ASCII : to export the content of a disk in a text file with a specified structure.
• XML : To export the content of a disk, a disks collection or the whole catalog in a XML file.

Importing/Exporting a disk

To import the content of a disk, first select the disk, then click on menu File | Import and select the format to use. To export a disk click on menu File | Export and select the format.

Exporting a disks collection (XML format only)

With the XML format, you can export or import a disks collection. To export a disks collection (it can be the whole catalog), select the group of disks in the tree window and click on menu File | Export | XML Export.

Repair catalog

You can check with this tool if the catalog is corrupted, and which disk is corrupted.

• Check catalog: Click on the button Check catalog to see if the catalog contains corrupted information.
• Rebuild catalog: Click on the button Rebuild catalogto create a new catalog file without the corrupted files. This function will also to repair the corrupted disks.

Files & folders properties

In the view Catalog, when selecting a file or a folder, you can see its properties displayed in the bottom panel. You can also open the properties window by right-clicking a the selected item, and click on Properties . In this dialog, all the properties of the file or folder are displayed :

• Name
• Location
• Size
• Creation date
• Modification date
• Last accessed date
• Attributs : read only, hidden, archive, system file
• Description : you can edit this field to specify a description of the file or folder. This field is used in the search window.

The search window helps you to search for files and folders, with multiple options.

• Define what you want to search: First, enter the name of the file/folder to find. You can also search for an extension file. For exemple, to find all files with extension '.txt', enter '*.txt'.
• Define where to perform the search: Then, specify where you want to search. You can search in a disk image, in a group of disks or in the whole catalog.
• Add search criteria: You can add criteria like size of file, modification date. You can specify if you want to search for files, folders or description.
• Perform the search: Click on the button Search
• Search results: When a file or a folder is found, it is automatically displayed in the results list. If the search query is not finished, you can stop by clicking on Stop. In the results list, you can display file properties with the contextual menu. To locate a file/folder in the catalog, click on Locate in the catalog : the search window will be closed and the application will found the selected file/folder in the catalog.