Bulk actions

Select multiple records at once and act on them together

Keeping an archive up-to-date can be repetitive: moving works to a new location, tagging a series, adding a group of works to a collection. Bulk actions let you select many works at once and act on all of them together.

Bulk actions work the same way everywhere in Valise:

  1. Select the records you want. A dark bar appears at the bottom of your window with a count of what you’ve selected.
  2. Choose Actions to see what you can do with them.

Selecting records

In any list, there’s a checkbox at the left of each row. Click it to select that row. If a list has a checkbox in its header, clicking it selects every row.

On your Artworks page, hover over a work to reveal a checkbox in the top-right corner of its image. Once anything is selected, clicking a work selects or deselects it instead of opening it, so you can click through the grid picking out the works you want. To go back to opening works normally, clear the selection.

You can also right-click a work on desktop, or press and hold it on mobile, to reach the same actions without going through the bar. If that work is part of a larger selection, the action applies to the whole selection.

Keyboard shortcuts

  • Cmd+A or Ctrl+A selects everything currently in the list.
  • Shift+click selects everything between your last click and the one you just made. This is the fastest way to grab a run of consecutive records.
  • Esc clears your selection.

These work anywhere you can select multiple records.

Actions menu

Alongside the count, the bar has an button to clear your selection and an Actions menu.

Actions vary depending on what you’re selecting. Most records offer options to copy a link or export data. Artwork records also offer bulk tag and collection edits, creating a consignment, exporting a PDF, or downloading images.

A few actions of note:

  • Edit collections on artworks works both ways. A checked collection means every work you’ve selected is already in it, and choosing it again takes them all back out. It can also make a new collection: type a name that doesn’t exist yet, press Create “your name”, and the works you selected go into it.
  • Edit tags on artworks adds or removes tags across your whole selection. Tags you don’t touch are left alone.
  • Set status, Set location, and Set dimensions on editions open pre-filled when every selected edition already has the same value. Read more about editions.
  • Merge on locations and tags only appears once you’ve selected two or more. It’s the tool for cleaning up duplicates like “Home Studio” and “Home studio”.
  • Star on press flips to Unstar when everything you’ve selected is already starred.
  • Duplicate on artworks only appears when a single work is selected.

The menu also reflects your role in the vault: actions that change or delete records are greyed out for viewers.

Destructive actions ask you to confirm first and tell you what will happen. Deleting a set of locations, for example, tells you how many artworks and editions will be unassigned.

Working with filters

Bulk actions pair well with filtering. Narrow a list to the records you want, press Cmd+A, then apply an action to all of them.

Selecting all picks up only the records currently in the list, not your whole vault. If you change your filters, the count updates to what’s still in view, and actions apply only to those.

There’s no limit on how many records you can select, though large exports and image downloads take longer to prepare. Your selection is kept for about a minute, so opening a record and coming back to the list won’t lose it.

Tips & tricks

  • Filter your artworks to a body of work, select all, and choose Edit collections.
  • Filter for works missing images, select all, and choose Copy artwork details to make a shot list.
  • Select every presentation with Cmd+A and choose Copy presentation details to paste an exhibition history straight into an application form.
  • Select a run of editions with Shift+click and choose Set location to move a whole shipment at once.

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