Chapter 4. Scanning

Technically GTKtalog is not limited to scanning CDs. It can scan CDs as well as directories on your hard drive. It can scan any device that can be mounted in your filesystem with "mount /path/to/device". In the unlikely case of  you not having a CD drive but only an iomega zip, you would specify the mount point of your zip drive in the GTKtalog preferences.

To start scanning a CD, click on the menu entry "Catalog/Add a new CD" or on the toolbar button "Add CD"

To start scanning a directory, click on the menu entry "Catalog/Add a new directory". In the "Select disk location" window, choose the root directory of the new disk. This directory must be somewhere on your filesystem. It can belong to a local disk drive or to a remote filesystem.

If you would like to override the settings in the Preferences for a scan, modify the check box "Retrieve information about files" and/or the scan mode. For informations on these options, see the Section called Retrieve information about files in Chapter 13 and the Section called Virtual file system scan mode in Chapter 13.

Type the disk label, then start the scan process by clicking on "OK".

During the scan process, GTKtalog runs through the CD or disk to get its file structure. The only case where GTKtalog does not reference a file is when it's MIME Type matches one of the "MIME Types to skip during a scan". In this case, the scan process skips the file.

See the scan option preferences : the Section called Scan mime type in Chapter 13, the Section called Virtual File Systems in Chapter 13, the Section called Information Plugins in Chapter 13

Obviously, the more files, the longer is the total scan process. You can cancel it anytime clicking on the "Abort" button of the Scanning window. The disk won't be added. The "Stop" button will add the new disk in a partially scanned state.