{"id":17796,"date":"2014-05-14T10:00:41","date_gmt":"2014-05-14T14:00:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/mediastorm.com\/blog\/?p=17796"},"modified":"2014-05-14T10:00:41","modified_gmt":"2014-05-14T14:00:41","slug":"mediastorm-guide-to-changing-file-names-with-automator","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.mediastorm.com\/blog\/2014\/05\/14\/mediastorm-guide-to-changing-file-names-with-automator\/","title":{"rendered":"MediaStorm Guide to Changing File Names with Automator"},"content":{"rendered":"

Sometimes when organizing assets you may want to add a word or two to a group of files. Fortunately, you don’t need to do this manually as OS X provides powerful built-in automation tools.<\/p>\n

In the Applications<\/strong> folder, open Automator<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

When you open Automator, you\u2019ll be presented with several options. Double-click Service<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Next, in the right-side panel, under Actions<\/strong> select Files & Folders<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Drag Files & Folders <\/strong>action to the right column. You will be presented with a dialogue box that says:<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

I chose the Don\u2019t Add<\/strong> button since any future changes can be made simply by using the service again as I explain below.<\/p>\n

At the top of the workflow, from the drop down menu, choose files or folders<\/strong> in Finder<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Below, in the Rename Finder Items <\/strong>action, select Add Text<\/strong> in the drop down menu. Most importantly, selects Options<\/strong> at the bottom and select Show this action when the workflows runs<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Finally, save<\/strong> the service (command-s)<\/strong> and name it something like rename<\/em>.<\/p>\n

Now when you return to the Finder, right-click<\/strong> a group of files and from the services menu choose your new service<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

A popup menu will appear with the option to add text at the beginning or end of your file names.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Enter text and hit the Continue<\/strong> button to quickly change your selected file names.<\/p>\n

Also available on the top of this window are numerous other file manipulation options including find and replace, add date, and change case.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

If you really want to get fancy, you can create a keyboard shortcut for your service as well.<\/p>\n

To do this, from the Apple<\/strong> menu in the menu bar select System Preferences\u2026<\/strong> and choose Keyboard<\/strong> on the second row. Finally, click Shortcuts<\/strong> at the top of the next window.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Select Services<\/strong> on the right side and scroll down to the Files and Folders <\/strong>section in the right column. Type a keystroke to set up your shortcut.<\/p>\n

Now, after you select your Finder files and folders, type the keystroke and you will be presented with the Rename Finder Items<\/strong> dialogue box.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Sometimes when organizing assets you may want to add a word or two to a group of files. Fortunately, you don’t need to do this manually as OS X provides powerful built-in automation tools. In the Applications folder, open Automator. When you open Automator, you\u2019ll be presented with several options. Double-click Service.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9,"featured_media":17805,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9,748],"tags":[1804,1734,1238],"class_list":["post-17796","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-tools","category-tutorials","tag-automator","tag-file-structure","tag-keyboard-shortcuts","entry","has-media"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mediastorm.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17796","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mediastorm.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mediastorm.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mediastorm.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/9"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mediastorm.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17796"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.mediastorm.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17796\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mediastorm.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/17805"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mediastorm.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17796"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mediastorm.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17796"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mediastorm.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17796"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}