DEVONthink for Mac

Tool for organizing, describing, searching, and linking text and multimedia documents

Creating Groups and Smart Groups

Groups in DT

Like folders in the Finder, DT allows you to keep documents/data organized in groups and subgroups in a way that makes sense.

  • To create a new Group, right-click (or Command-click) on the opened database name on the left sidebar and select “New  Group,”  or on the top menu, select Data -> New -> Group.

Create a new group  OR 

  • To select/move multiple files into a group, click/drag or use command-click/drag for multiple files. Note that you can use Command-Z to undo moving files.

  • To move files around, select files and right-click the selected files. Then, select “Move To” -> destination group or database. You can also click/drag files and then move them to the destination group or database. 

DT's Artificial Intelligence (AI) algorithms makes grouping documents in an automatic way. The AI compares document contents and locations and offers suggestions for where items may best be filed. As more documents are grouped into a DT database, manually or taking the AI's suggestions, it becomes more and more adept at helping you group more efficiently. 

Smart Groups in DT

You can also create Smart groups (starting with), which allow you to create virtual groups matching specified criteria. Items can appear in more than one Smart Group without duplicating files explicitly. To create a Smart Group, right-click or Control-click on the database on the left sidebar and then select New -> Smart Group… OR on the top menu, select Data -> New -> Smart Group….

*Note: When a database is created, as a default, the following predefined Smart groups are added automatically: All Images, All PDF Documents, and Duplicates. 

Create a smart group OR 

Then, a screen will appear with many options to specify file kinds, subgroups, certain terms appearing in the content, metadata, tags, file extensions, etc. Smart groups can also be set based on custom metadata in the rule.