Mylio Photos’ search modifiers and advanced search expressions can help you locate specific photos by narrowing down the search results.
Search Modifiers
When a single word, such as sunset
, is entered into the search field, the results will display any media that contains precisely that word in the filename, description, title, or keywords. It also searches named people and words found by optical character recognition (OCR).
You can make your search more specific by using search modifiers. The most commonly used are AND
, OR
, IN
, NOT
, “ ”
and ( )
. They can be used in several ways and combinations to indicate what you want to be included or excluded in your search.
- Common Search Modifier Descriptions
-
Modifier Description AND
Finds results that have both words. For example, sunset and beach
will find photos with the words sunset and beach in the filename, description, title, keywords, people, or using OCR text recognition.OR
Finds results that have either word. For example, sunset or beach
will find photos with the words sunset or beach in the filename, description, title, keywords, people, or using OCR text recognition.IN
Specifies searching within places, folders, or albums. For example, sunset in California
will find photos containing the word “sunset” where the image is geotagged in California (place) or is part of a folder or album named California.NOT
Excludes words from search results. For example, sunset not beach
, will find photos with the word sunset that DO NOT have the word beach.“ “
Quotation marks can be used to search for an exact phrase. For example, a search for sunset beach
will look for the individual words sunset and beach. A search for“sunset beach”
will search for the phrase as entered between the quotation marks.Combining modifiers can make for powerful searches and help you find the photo you want. For example, entering
Sarah and Madelaine in Alaska
will return images where both Sarah and Madeline are in the photo, and the picture is geotagged with a location in Alaska. You can try this specific search if you have installed the Sample Library.
Advanced Search Expressions
If you haven’t found the media you’re looking for with common search modifiers, you may want to try using advanced search expressions in Mylio Photos. Entering a word into Mylio Photos’ search field is an expression. Expressions can be grouped or modified to customize your search results.
- Common Expressions
-
( )
– Parentheses let you group search expressions. For example:(sunset not beach) in California
will find photos that contain the word “sunset”, exclude pictures that have the word “beach” and only show those that are in a place, folder, or album named California.
expression1 expression2
– Two expressions (words) specified one after the other imply anAND
. For example,sunset beach
will find photos with the words sunset and beach anywhere in the filename, caption, title, keywords, people, or using OCR text recognition.
AND
– Finds results that have both words. For example,sunset and beach
will find photos with the words sunset and beach in the filename, caption, title, keywords, people, or using OCR text recognition.AND
expressions can also be input as&&
and&
(e.g.sunset & beach
).
OR
– Finds results that have either word. For example,sunset or beach
will find photos that have either the words “sunset” or “beach” in the filename, caption, title, keywords, people, or using OCR text recognition.OR
expressions can also be input as|
and||
. (e.g.sunset | beach
)
IN
– Specifies searching within places, folders, or albums. For example,sunset in California
will find photos containing the word “sunset” in a place, folder, or album named “California”.
NOT
– Excludes words from search results. For example,sunset not beach
will find photos with the word “sunset” that DO NOT have the word “beach”.NOT
expressions can also be input as-
. (e.g.sunset - beach
)
- Term-or-Value
- Term-or-Value Expressions
-
Term-or-value expressions let you narrow your search to a specific type. Term is the type of item you’re looking for, and value is the name of the item you want to find. Here are a couple of examples:
album: Animals
– “Album” is the term, and “Animals” is the value. This search would display Albums with the name Animals.-make: Canon
– “NOT make” is the term (-
is short forNOT
) and “Canon” is the value. The search would display all photos not taken by a Canon camera.
Scroll down to view the complete list of possible term-or-value expressions that can be used in Mylio Photos’ search.
Using Strings to Customize Your Search
A search string combines characters and words that make up a search query and can be further used to customize a search. In Mylio Photos, you can use punctuation (apostrophes, quotation marks, parentheses, and asterisks) to modify your search.
- Custom String Search Example
-
As an example, we’ll search for a photo that has the following caption:
The “quick” brown fox jumps over the lazy dog
Custom String Description fox dog
Two expressions (words) specified one after the other imply an AND
. For example, a search forfox dog
will find photos with the words “fox” and “dog” in the filename, caption, title, keywords, and people, or using OCR text recognition.caption: fox
Using the explicit search term caption:
limits the search to just captions and will search the whole word. It will not match “foxtrot”, “outfox”, or “outfoxed”.caption: =’The “quick” brown fox jumps over the lazy dog’
The equals sign =
tells Mylio Photos to search the caption exactly, including capitalization. Using an apostrophe'
before and after the caption allows the quotation marks in the caption to be included.caption: ”The quick*”
Adding the asterisk *
at the end of the string looks for captions that start with “The quick”.caption: ”*lazy dog”
Adding the asterisk *
at the start of the string looks for captions that end with “lazy dog”.caption: *row*
Using an asterisk *
before and after the letters “r”, “o”, and “w” in that order will look for words, including partial spellings, so the word “brown” would be included in the search results.caption: *ju?ps*
Using a question mark ?
in this way will search for captions that contain a word that starts with “ju” and any single letter, followed by “ps” so the word “jumps” would be included in the search results.date: >2012 AND date: <2015
Using less than >
and greater than<
symbols are useful in specifying date ranges. When entering dates, they can be formatted as YYYY/MM/DD or MM/DD/YYYY (e.g. 2012/08/20 or 04/20/2014). You can also add a specific time using YYYY/MM/DDTHH:MM:SS (e.g. 2020/01/02T10:30:00).
Using Explicit Search Terms in Mylio Photos
Expand the list below to view all available explicit search terms that can be used in Mylio Photos.
- Explicit Search Terms
-
Search Expression Example Description album: text
album: Landscapes
Find text in Album names. author: text
author: J.C. Figueroa
Find text in creator IPTC field. cameras: text
cameras: canon
Find text in camera model field. caption: text
caption: sunset
Find text in Caption fields. categories: text
categories: travel
Find text in Categories. color: text
color: yellow
Find files with specified color labels. copyright: text
copyright: J.C. Figueroa
Find text in copyright IPTC field. creator: text
creator: J.C. Figueroa
Find text in creator IPTC field. date: date
date: 07/20/2021
Will Search the text in the Date Created field in the Info Tab. Dates can be entered as MM/DD/YYYY
description: text
description: sunset
Find text in Description fields. edited: boolean
edited: true
Find edited or unedited images. Boolean can be entered as true
,false
,on
,off
, etc.ext: file extension
ext: .nef
Find files with a specified extension (e.g. .dng
,.jpg
,.cr2
,_display.jpg
, etc.).facecount: number
facecount: 2
Find photos with the specified number of faces detected. file: text
file: IMG_2644
Find text in the filename field. flagged: number
flagged: 1
Find media with Pick Flags 1
, no Flags0
, or Reject Flags-1
.flash: boolean
flash: true
Find images with or without flash used. folder: text
folder: scans
Find text in Folder names. gpstagged: boolean
gpstagged: no
Find images with or without GPS location data. Boolean can be entered as true
,false
,on
,off
, etc.importdate: date
importdate: 04/19/2022
Will search dates from the Import Date field. Dates can be entered as MM/DD/YYYY
iso: number
iso: 400
Find images captured with the specified ISO. keyword: text
keyword: lake
Find text in the Keyword field. label: text
label: yellow
Find files with specified color labels. lens: text
lens: tamron
Find text in the lens field. lostoriginals: boolean
lostoriginals: true
Will show lost originals in the Catalog. Boolean can be entered as true
,false
,on
,off
, etc.make: text
make: nikon
Find text in camera make field. model: text
model: 6D
Find text in camera model field. ocr: text
ocr: ninja
Search only optical character recognition (OCR) orphan: boolean
orphan: yes
Find photos in the catalog that do not have an assigned folder. people: text
people: Sarah
Search for People’s names. peoplecount: number
peoplecount: 2
Find photos with the specified number of people tagged. place: text
place: alaska
,place: "kitsap county"
,place: "madison street"
Search the text in the Places field. rating: number
rating: 4
Find files with the specified star rating (1-5). size: number
size: <5000
Find files based on the file size in bytes or optionally add greater than >
or less than<
symbols. (e.g., less than 5000 bytes or 50KB)text: text
text: dolphins
Search for text in all fields (filename, caption, title, keyword, OCR, etc.). title: text
title: lake
Search for text in the Title field. unprotected: boolean
unprotected: true
Find files that need to sync to other devices. Boolean can be entered as true
,false
,on
,off
, etc.unsupported: boolean
unsupported: yes
Find files Mylio Photos does not support. Boolean can be entered as true
,false
,on
,off
, etc.video: boolean
video: true
Find only video files. Boolean can be entered as true
,false
,on
,off
, etc.
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