Is it possible to change the Status of a multiple documents selection?
When I select multiple documents in the Binder, the only things I see in the Inspector are the Project Notes and the Project References. Is there any other way to change the status of the documents except one by one?
Windows 1.9.7.0
The contextual menu is the best (and often only) tool for making bulk metadata changes to selected items. The main exception is keywording, which involves dragging keywords onto a selection to make a batch assignment.
Thank you!
I didn’t think of that. 
Adding a follow-up question…
Is it possible to bulk change metadata right from the Outliner ? A right click works with List-type metadata but not with checkboxes…
Checkboxes can be batch toggled by holding down the Alt key when you click on one of them. Either all visible items will be toggled, or if there is a selection, only items within the selection will be toggled.
This may not work in the stable version of Scrivener, I didn’t check that, I just double-checked in the beta though.
It works on my version too (3.1) ! Alt key to the rescue as usual.
Thank you very much.
Is there any way to select a group of documents and assign a label to all of them, without having to click each of them?
Right-click (Windows screenshot)
Same on Mac, though Ctrl-Click if you don’t have Right-click set up on your mouse or trackpad.
Mark
This has been merged with an existing topic on the matter. I clicked the magnifying glass in the upper right corner of the forum, and typed in “metadata batch change” to find it.
Is there a way to batch change a custom metadata field (not the built-in fields like label or status) from the outline (or any other) view?
No.
But a fast way of doing it is using outline view so they are all lined up.
You can then use copy/paste if the new input is the same for all of them.
Here’s an even better way to enable collection organization: treat collections like aliases (in unix, for example). Let us create collections then move them into folders in the binder, as one can do with aliases. You’d need some indicator to distinguish items in a collection from documents, but that’s easy.
All the various ad hoc suggestions in this thread show that there is a real need for organizing collections. Some of the above suggestions would work in some cases, but each has a cost. A simple, uniform mechanism for organizing collections would be a very helpful thing. I hope it make it to the future features list.
I don’t quite follow the segue into collections for this matter, how that would help in batch setting metadata, or how using different methods of setting metadata indicates anything about how collections need a different organisation scheme. Perhaps this was posted in the wrong thread on accident?
At any rate, to the matter at hand, yes: List and Checkbox metadata fields can be batch set, as described above (lists work just like labels/status). Text and Date fields cannot, which is a bit of an oversight, but one that’s been around for so long I wouldn’t expect it to change.
Hello,
Is there a way to change labels in batches?
I have started to organize (finally) all the different projects and texts in Scrivener, and labeling is a big part of that. But it’s becoming extremely tedious to go one by one.
I have tried multiple selecting and changing the label, but it seems it only applies to the first selected document.
Is there a way to do this?
Thank you
No, but you can drag labels by selecting and highlighting and take multiple labels from one project to another. So if one project has some useful labels (characters, locations, etc) can drag from one project settings panel to another in a different project.
There are notes above, in the discussion this has been merged with. You will also find further information on bulk metadata operations in the user manual PDF, §10.4.7, Setting Metadata to Many Items.
Select the desired files in the binder, right click.
See my screenshot a couple of posts up above.
Thank you.
I thought that’s the first obvious thing I tried, and it didn’t work. Now I have tried it it worked.