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

1. Select an item
2. Click the tag field in the Inspector (or press T)
3. Typing shows incremental suggestions, ordered by most recently used
4. 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 — tags often used together with the ones already on the item. Tag something "Client A" and "Invoice" can show up right away without retyping it every time. 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.

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
• From the keyboard: focus the row, press Right or Down to step inside, Up / Down to choose, Enter to filter (Alt+Enter to exclude), and Esc or Left to go 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

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

There is no OR search

Filtering by "A or B" is not provided. Tags are expressed with AND (has all of them) plus exclusions.

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)
• 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