[Feature Request] Multi folders management, multi project instance

[jessearmandse]

I'm suggesting either of these two features

1. Multi folders management
   There are situations where we often need to open multiple folders of images and annotations set, and we want to save this configuration, then switch to other dataset.

Currently, the only way to do that is closing all the folder and change which folders are being opened. This can be inefficient when we're working on large numbers of folders, and switching between different set.

2. Multi project instance
   Similar concept to above, but this also includes the label configuration being used for the folders that are currently open

This 2nd feeature can actually be the foundation of multi folders management, as it manages:

• labels and label format
• images and annotations
• any other extra settings

[ryouchinsa]

Thanks for writing the issue.

Improved so that when open an images folder which includes sub-folders recursively, the same sub-folders are structured in the annotations folder. The new version 2025.01.11 was released.

Checking on the "Read images folder recursively" option, you can easily switch to another project which includes multiple images and annotations folders.

nested.mp4

Hi @clivinn-shla81092, thanks for introducing your product. If you have any ideas to collaborate with RectLabel, please let us know.

[jessearmandse]

Thanks for the quick follow-up.

Those are good changes, but what I'm thinking is to be able to manage the images - annotations folders that have been set on that dialog window.

For example use case, when I'm working with project A, I have specific arrangement:

• ~/Documents/dataset-A1/images
• ~/Documents/dataset-A1/annotations
• ~/Documents/dataset-A2/images
• ~/Documents/dataset-A2/annotations
• ~/Documents/dataset-A3/images
• ~/Documents/dataset-A3/annotations

Then, I decided to open project B:

• ~/Documents/dataset-B0/images
• ~/Documents/dataset-B0/annotations
• ~/Documents/dataset-B1/images
• ~/Documents/dataset-B1/annotations
• ~/Documents/dataset-B2/images
• ~/Documents/dataset-B2/annotations

Then, I closed project B, because I have to fix the annotations for project A. Then, when I reopen the configuration for project A, I don't need re-setup all the dataset pairs again.

Assuming there's a configuration file project-A.yaml. This is just an example, I'm not very sure how should this configuration be saved. Then, the dataset configuration is:

• ~/Documents/dataset-A1/images
• ~/Documents/dataset-A1/annotations
• ~/Documents/dataset-A2/images
• ~/Documents/dataset-A2/annotations
• ~/Documents/dataset-A3/images
• ~/Documents/dataset-A3/annotations

Which is the same dataset that I opened before working on project B

[ryouchinsa]

Thanks for reporting the detailed use-case.

~/Documents/dataset-A/dataset-A0/images
~/Documents/dataset-A/dataset-A0/annotations

In the next update, please set ~/Documents/dataset-A to both images and annotations folders.
RectLabel can find images in the ~/Documents/dataset-A/dataset-A0/images folder.
For the annotations folder, RectLabel replaces the "images" in the image folder with "annotations".

subpath.mp4

[ryouchinsa]

The new version 2025.01.30 was released.

Improved so that when open images and annotations folders, you can drag & drop the root folder.
For example, you can drag&drop the dataset-A folder to the open table and the child folders are automatically set.
~/Documents/dataset-A/dataset-A0/images
~/Documents/dataset-A/dataset-A0/annotations
~/Documents/dataset-A/dataset-A1/images
~/Documents/dataset-A/dataset-A1/annotations

multiple_folders.mp4