Adding comments to a file in windows explorer.

[VanguardLH]

I have seen programs that provide additional info on files. They run as
a background process. For a file, you use this other software to add
notes or comments for the file. Then later you can review those notes.
Alas, I've never bothered to use such file tracking software to add
comments to them so someone else would have to comment on such software.

Here's some I found with a "file note" search at Softpedia.com. Never
used any so cannot comment on how they work, how well they work, if they
are stable in staying in sync between their comments database and the
files they track, and how you could move those comments to another host
when you copy your files to another host. I didn't bother to
descriminate freeware from payware in the search.

http://www.softpedia.com/get/System/File-Management/FileNote.shtml
http://www.softpedia.com/get/System/File-Management/Atlast-File-Notes-Organizer.shtml
http://www.softpedia.com/get/System/System-Miscellaneous/FileNotes.shtml

The alt.comp.freeware group may have more experience and recommendations
for such file tracking and commenting software.

To give easy (well, easier) access to ADS to use that scheme to attach
forked content to files, they listed some tools like:

http://www.softpedia.com/get/System/File-Management/ADS-Manager.shtml
(later version: http://www.mickbitsoftware.com/en/news_2011_04_24)

If you don't know which files have an ADS (unlike the OP using your
suggestion who would know they are adding an ADS to each of their media
files), there are tools to go scanning the files to report which ones
have an ADS, like SysInternal's 'streams'.

 

[VanguardLH]

Many files, such as images, media files, Office files, have places in
the file format to store this kind of information. For other files,
WinXP used NTFS alternate streams to store these things. But MS
dropped that when they brought out Vista.

Alternate data streams is a feature of NTFS, not the version of Windows.
If you're using NTFS under Windows then you still have alternate data
streams.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ntfs#Alternate_data_streams_.28ADS.29
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alternate_data_stream#Microsoft

On Vista, and later, Microsoft did grant some visibility of alternate
data streams; e.g., run "dir /r".

On Windows XP, and earlier, it was possible to execute code from an
alternate data stream using the 'start' command (a command internal to
cmd.exe), as in "start mainfile:hiddencode". What changed as of Vista,
and later, was to remove the ability to execute code from an alternate
data stream. That only eliminated direct execution using Windows
programs. Malware can still read its malicious code in the ADS and then
load it as an executable image into memory and pass control to it.

 

[Tim Slattery]

Alternate data streams is a feature of NTFS, not the version of Windows.
If you're using NTFS under Windows then you still have alternate data
streams.

Yes, I know that. My point was that in XP you would get an extra tab
on the "Properties" dialog for *all* files. For files that didn't have
the capability to store meta-data within them, the data on that tab
would be stored in an ADS. They dropped that extra tab in Vista.

On Vista, and later, Microsoft did grant some visibility of alternate
data streams; e.g., run "dir /r".

I didn't know that, thank you.

 

[VanguardLH]

My point was that in XP you would get an extra tab
on the "Properties" dialog for *all* files. For files that didn't have
the capability to store meta-data within them, the data on that tab
would be stored in an ADS. They dropped that extra tab in Vista.

Right now I'm on Windows XP Professional SP-3. I did the following in a
command shell to add an alternate data stream to a text file:

echo you can see this > testfile.txt
echo you should not see this > testfile.txt:hidden.txt

I can see the main stream by entering:

type testfile.txt

I can see the alternate stream by entering:

notepad testfile.txt:hidden.txt

I can use Rekenwonder's Stream Explorer to see both streams or use
Nirsoft's Alternate Stream Viewer to see the alternate stream and choose
to copy, open, or delete it.

However, in Windows Explorer and looking at the Properties for this
file, there is no All Files tab. I've also looked at the properties for
..mpg, .avi, and .wmv files but the metadata was under the Summary tab
and there was no All Files tab. For metadata *in* the files that
Windows Explorer would show, I always had to go to Summary and to see
more I'd click on the Advanced button.

If I edited the Properties shown under the Summary tab for the file's
properties, yep, additional alternate streams got created to hold that
info; however, no new All Files or Streams tab appeared in the file's
Property dialog. Just the Summary tab was there with the ADS-held
metadata.

Methinks you must have had a shell extension (for explore.exe) that
added a properties page for the All Files tab. Remember what it was?
Sans shows some code to add another property page to show ADS
(http://www.sans.org/reading_room/whitepapers/honors/alternate-data-streams-shadows-light_1503,
page 32) but they happen to name the tab "Streams". I've seen software
that added a context menu entry to list the ADS but doesn't let you do
much with the ADS other than to highlight existence with an
"fingerprint" overlay icon on the file icon shown by Windows Explorer
(http://www.benf.org/other/alternatestreamoverlay/index.html). Maybe
you installed Microsoft's ADS property page extension NTFSext.exe
(Microsoft dropped it so there's no working download link anymore but I
found info at http://www.2kevin.net/StrmExt_dll.txt) that added a
Streams property tab.

 

[Peter Jason]

I have Win7 SP1. How do I add comments to any file in Windows
Explorer. I recall that in Windows XP one could type in any desired
remark and this would then be attached to the file and this could then
be displayed in the Explorer right window.

I can do this for image files, but not for mpg files.

In Win 7 when I get to the "Properties" and go to the "Details" tab,
all the details are locked and there is no way to enter details in the
"comments" dialogue. Is there some way around this, and how much
text can I enter in the 'comments' property. Is there a "memo" like
in Access?

I wanted to add the NY Times critic's movie review (the "Review
Summary") to each movie in my collection: e.g.
http://movies.nytimes.com/movie/180767/Fight-Club/overview
in the mpg properties.

I can do this in other files such as jpgs in the 'comments' .

Thanks for the suggestions.

 

[Peanut]

I wanted to add the NY Times critic's movie review (the "Review
Summary") to each movie in my collection: e.g.
http://movies.nytimes.com/movie/180767/Fight-Club/overview
in the mpg properties.

I can do this in other files such as jpgs in the 'comments' .

Thanks for the suggestions.

If the file is .mp4, you can add comments the same as .jpg

 

[HCTech]

The whole point is the comments could easily be added to most any file type when using XP and now in Windows 7 we are limited pretty much to Office files - .doc, etc. I still have seen no plausible explanation from Microsoft as to why the very useful feature was deleted for such files as a pdf. I would like to see a common sense reason for the feature being eliminated, or just admit they screwed up and if they have any intention of fixing this issue. Overall, I've seen none to VERY little improvement in going from XP to Windows 7.

 

[Dijji]

A FOSS solution

This bugged me too. So I had closer look. Turns out you just need a 17K property handler to link Explorer to properties stored in those alternate data streams. All the serialization capability is already built in to the file system. It worked well, so I thought I'd share as FOSS.

You can get the code, binaries and documentation here: http://filemeta.codeplex.com/

 

[HCTech]

Thanks for the info. My technical expertise is lacking but I'll follow your link to see if I can fix the issue with what you've provided, but I expect I'll need some help as I have no clue what the "code" and "binaries" are.

 

[HCTech]

Dijji - I can't thank you enough!! I followed your directions and even for a rookie like me they were clear and easy. Net result is that now I can add comments to the file extensions. I selected pdf and txt extensions to start. THANKS AGAIN!!!

 

[Dijji]

Thank you! I'm really pleased that it has worked for you. Feel free to tell your friends or colleagues about it!

If you have any problems or suggestions, please let me know, either here or at http://filemeta.codeplex.com/

Dijji