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Does anyone know any free alternatives to Informator?

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As a sidenote, this doesn't deal with EXIF metadata only. I'm hoping for video, music, and who knows what else beside images metadata. Being able to view and edit as well.

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2 Answers 2

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If you're not afraid of using the Terminal:

mdls /path/to/file
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  • 2
    +1; you (probably) do not need any more than this
    – trolle3000
    Feb 28, 2010 at 0:19
  • That's great, but I couldn't find how to edit the metadata with it, which is what I wanted. It seems it's not possible. And I still hope for a GUI. :)
    – cregox
    Mar 2, 2010 at 17:12
  • mdls is read-only. xattr can write the data Jun 3, 2010 at 21:43
  • How do I see FPS using that?
    – Matt Frear
    Feb 26, 2015 at 13:52
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Unfortunately there do not see to be any tools which let you edit the Apple metadata beyond the standards created for digital images like EXIF, which I understand you aren't concerned about.

You can achieve the writing of metadata elements such as kMDItemWhereFroms in the Terminal using the xattr command. mdls is for reading the metadata only.

Example for writing the file's origin:

xattr -w com.apple.metadata:kMDItemWhereFroms 'http://www.example.com' <filename>

See more here

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  • ¡I think You Can, I think I just figured it out! It's listed in the developer's tools, although you still might be able to do it if you haven't downloaded them. If you have, check out: /Developer/Tools/SetFile If not, here's a manual page: developer.apple.com/mac/library/documentation/Darwin/Reference/… From what I understand, xattr changes extended metadata (extra stuff I guess?) while SetFile will change things like creation date, last opened, all those. Not sure if this is what you're looking for, but it's something!
    – Brett Johnson
    May 30, 2010 at 19:04
  • @Frost Shadow. We are trying to change the extended metadata. SetFile won't change kMD metadata. Cheers for the info though Jun 3, 2010 at 21:41

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