Organizing with Tags¶

Melanite has no folders. Tags are the only classification.

An item can have any number of tags (including zero)
Tags are flat — tags themselves cannot be nested
Tags can be loosely bundled into tag groups (one level only)

Tags think differently from folders

A folder makes you pick one place; tags let you apply everything that fits. Tag an invoice PDF with "invoice", "Client A", and "2026", and you can reach it from any angle. When unsure, apply them all.

Adding tags¶

From the Inspector¶

Select an item
Click the tag field in the Inspector (or press T)
Typing shows incremental suggestions, ordered by most recently used
Confirm with Enter. For a name that doesn't exist, "Create: xxx" appears

Related tag suggestions

Open the suggestion list with the field still empty and you get your 5 most recently used tags on top, then up to 5 more marked "Related" below them. Related tags come from the other items that carry every tag this item already has, ranked by how many of those items each remaining tag appears on. With "Client A" and "2026" on the item, only items carrying both are counted — so each tag you add narrows the suggestions further. Recently used tags always stay on top, so related suggestions never push them out of view. The related section doesn't appear on items with no tags yet (nothing to relate to).

Drag & drop¶

Either direction works.

Drag this	Onto this	Result
A tag in the Sidebar	An item in the grid / list	The tag is applied to that item
An item in the grid / list	A tag in the Sidebar	That tag is applied to the item

In both directions, if what you grabbed is part of the current selection, the tag is applied to the whole selection. Tagging a lot of files at once is fastest this way: select them all, then drop them onto the tag in the Sidebar.

Reaching items or tags that are off-screen

While dragging, move the cursor near the top or bottom edge of the list or the Sidebar and it scrolls automatically — faster the closer you get to the edge. Just keep holding until your target comes into view, then drop.

Drop targets that don't light up

When every item you are dragging already has that tag, nothing would change, so the tag doesn't highlight and dropping does nothing. It doubles as a quick way to check whether a tag is already applied. Items in the Trash can't be dragged.

Copy & paste tags¶

Key	Action
`Cmd`+`Shift`+`C` / `Ctrl`+`Shift`+`C`	Copy the selected items' tags (union if multiple)
`Cmd`+`Shift`+`V` / `Ctrl`+`Shift`+`V`	Apply them to the selected items

Handy for "give this file the same tags as that one".

Automatically on import¶

Importing while filtered by tags applies those tags automatically. → Importing Files

Bulk operations on multiple items¶

Select multiple items and the Inspector's tag field switches to bulk mode.

Solid tags — every selected item has this tag
Dashed tags — only some of the selected items have it

Adding or removing in this state affects the entire selection.

Tag groups¶

When tags pile up, bundle them into groups.

Groups are one level only (no groups inside groups)
Tags without a group gather under "Ungrouped"
Groups can have a color, which their tags inherit

The color shows up as dots under grid cards, on list tags, and as map pin colors.

Group operations¶

Task	How
Create / rename / delete a group	From the tag area in the Sidebar
Move a tag to another group	Drag & drop the tag onto a group heading
Remove from a group	Drop the tag onto the "Ungrouped" heading
Collapse / expand	Click the group heading (state is remembered)

Note

While dragging a tag, the "Ungrouped" heading is shown even when empty (as a drop target).

Managing tags¶

Ordering¶

Sidebar tags are ordered by group, then by tag name within each group. "Ungrouped" comes last. Digits inside a name are compared as numbers, so report2 sorts before report10.

Everywhere several tags line up, they follow that same order:

The "Tags" column in list view
The color dots under grid cards
Each row of Quick Open (Cmd+P / Ctrl+P)
The tag field in the Inspector
The filter chip bar above the item list (not the order you clicked them in)
Map pin colors (the pin takes the color of the first colored tag)
Tags in the Command Palette (Cmd+Shift+P / Ctrl+Shift+P)
The merge target in the tag edit dialog

Note

For the tags on an item, this is not the order in which you added them. Any two items with the same set of tags show them in the same order, which makes them easier to compare.

Finding tags by group

Tags in the Command Palette are categorized as "Tag / group name", so typing a group name narrows the list to that group's tags.

Lists whose order carries meaning are left alone: the Inspector's completion suggestions stay in most-recently-used order, and Top tags in the statistics dialog stays in usage order.

Finding a tag¶

The "Search tags" box at the top of the Sidebar's tag area filters tags by partial name match. All groups are expanded while filtering.

You can find and apply tags without the mouse. Press F (or F4) to focus the box, walk the tags with Up Down, then Enter to filter by one and Alt+Enter to exclude it — the same actions as clicking and Alt + clicking. Focus stays in the box afterwards, so you can type another name to add a second tag, or press Enter again to take one back off. See Keyboard shortcuts for the details.

Recent tags¶

Hover over "Recent tags" at the top of the tag area and the last 10 tags you applied appear beside it — a way back to the tag you were just using without hunting for it.

Click to filter by that tag, Alt + click to exclude it (the same as the tags in the Sidebar)
Right-click for the edit / exclude menu. The list stays open until you pick an entry (or dismiss the menu), with the tag you right-clicked outlined
From the keyboard: R (Recent) opens it from anywhere and steps straight to the first entry; Right or Enter do the same when the row itself has focus. Inside, Up / Down choose, Enter filters (Alt+Enter excludes), and Esc or Left goes back to the row

The order is when you last applied each tag to an item. Filtering by a tag does not change it, so a tag you looked at once does not stay pinned to the top.

It never takes more than one row

Only the single "Recent tags" row is permanently in the Sidebar. The list itself appears on hover, so a growing tag collection never squeezes the sidebar.

Usage counts¶

Each tag shows the number of items using it on the right.

Rename, delete, merge¶

Right-click a tag in the Sidebar.

Rename — items keep the tag
Delete — only the tag disappears; items are untouched
Merge — merges tag A into tag B. Every item that had A now has B. Type in the target box to narrow the tags, then pick one with ↑↓ and Enter (space-separated words must all match)

When to merge

Merge cleans up spelling variants after the fact — "Rust" vs. "rust", or different spellings of the same word.

Filtering¶

Click a tag in the Sidebar to start filtering.

Multiple selection — click to add, click again to remove
Multiple tags combine as AND (items that have all selected tags)
Selected tags appear in the chip bar under the toolbar (color dot + name + ×). Remove one with "×"; with two or more, "Clear all" also appears

Tag filtering combines with the search box and kind filters as AND.

Excluding a tag¶

When you'd rather not see items carrying a tag, exclude it.

Alt + click the tag in the Sidebar, or right-click → "Exclude This Tag"
Excluded tags appear struck through with a "−" in the Sidebar, and as a red chip ("Excluding:") in the chip bar
Use the same action, or the chip's "×", to stop excluding

Excluding combines with filtering (AND): filter by "work" while excluding "done" and only the items still in progress remain.

A tag can't be filtered and excluded at the same time (picking one clears the other)
It has no effect while viewing "Untagged" (those items have no tags to exclude)
Saving a smart filter stores the exclusions along with everything else

To list items that carry any of the tags in a group (say, "Client A, B, or C"), filter by the group.

Right-click a group heading in the Sidebar → "Filter by This Group"
Items that have at least one of the group's tags are listed (an item with two of them still counts once)
While active, the group heading is highlighted with a funnel mark on its right, and a "Groups:" chip appears in the chip bar
To stop, right-click again → "Stop Filtering by This Group", or use the chip's "×"

A group counts as one condition. It combines with tags and other groups as AND: filter by the "Clients" group and select the "In progress" tag, and only items that belong to some client and are in progress remain.

Tags you move into the group later are included automatically (in saved smart filters too)
Can be saved in a smart filter, and Melanite Viewer gives the same result
Groups can't be excluded

There is no OR search for tags

Picking tags one by one to get "A or B" is not provided. Put the tags you want to match "any of" into the same group and filter by the group.

Find items with the same tags as the selection¶

Select an item and a "Search by these tags" button appears next to the tag-field heading in the Inspector. Press it to switch the filter to that item's tags (AND), listing items that share the same tags.

With multiple items selected, the button becomes "Search by shared tags" and filters by the tags common to all selected items
The previous search text and tag selection are replaced (the items you had selected remain in the results)

Example

Want more items like the one you're looking at? Instead of hunting for the tag in the Sidebar, select the item and click "Search by these tags" — one click lists its kin.

Untagged¶

The Sidebar's "Untagged" shows only items with no tags at all. Use it to clean up items that were imported but never organized.

Tagging doesn't clear your selection

Adding a tag while viewing "Untagged" removes the item from the list (it isn't untagged any more). The selection stays, and so does the Inspector — so you can add a second and third tag, or write a memo, without reselecting. Move on by clicking the next item in the list, or press Esc to return to the list.

The same applies when a rename makes an item stop matching your search.

Favorites (stars)¶

A one-bit flag, lighter than a tag. For marking "read later" or "frequently used".

Action	How
Toggle	`S` key / right-click menu / the ★ next to the name in the Inspector
Filter	"Favorites" in the Sidebar

With multiple items selected, toggling is bulk (if all are favorites, unstar; otherwise star all). This covers the whole selection even when Cmd+A / Ctrl+A or the calendar's "Select these N items" reaches beyond the rows currently on screen (in that case the right-click menu doesn't guess a direction: it offers both "Add to Favorites" and "Remove from Favorites")
A ★ badge appears at the top right of grid thumbnails, and to the right of names in the list
Combines with tags, search, and kinds