Comments on: MacMost Now 312 : Batch Rename Multiple Files

By: Jefe del Fresco

Jefe del Fresco — Thu, 04 Mar 2010 01:31:21 +0000

Awesomely helpful tutorial. I didn’t even know I had something called Automator. Gary, you just saved me a tedious hour today, and many more in the future. Thanks!

By: Gary Rosenzweig

Gary Rosenzweig — Wed, 23 Dec 2009 14:16:50 +0000

It sounds like maybe you had something installed that gave you that functionality? Perhaps you installed a piece of third-party software that gave you some functions like that.

By: Scotty

Scotty — Wed, 23 Dec 2009 14:04:17 +0000

What I meant was, the renamer was only one of the Automator functions I had on my right-click menu.
It was Right-Click/More/Automator/renamer (or something similar)

I had a few functions I liked having in that menu, but I don’t get ‘More’ on the right click menu any more.

Thanks for the reply. I’ll hang up and listen.

By: Gary Rosenzweig

Gary Rosenzweig — Wed, 23 Dec 2009 04:55:30 +0000

Just select a file and press the Return key on your keyboard. Alternatively, you can select the file, wait a second so it isn’t a double-click, and click on the name of the file. Both will then allow you to edit the name.

By: Scotty

Scotty — Wed, 23 Dec 2009 03:35:14 +0000

Hi. Before Snow Leopard, I was able to have a simple renamer action appear in my Finder right-click menu.

Since I updated to Snow Leopard, I don’t see that option. What happened, and how do I get it back?

By: Lorelei

Lorelei — Wed, 16 Dec 2009 07:24:45 +0000

I was looking for a way to do the exact same thing, for the same reason; I found this in searching for it. Failing, though, I wrote the AppleScript to do it. I thought I’d share, in case you were still looking for a way:

(*
This is a script to append random numbers to the beginnings of file names. Originally created for the purpose of randomizing pictures for adding to a digital frame.

It will, as the warning says, rename original files rather than creating copies. But hey, it warns you first!

Written 16 Dec 2009, by LoreleiF
Written in Snow Leopard, but should be good at least down to Tiger.
*)

tell application “Finder”

set theFolder to (choose folder)

display dialog “WARNING: This will NOT create copies of your files – it will rename the originals. Continue?” buttons {”Yes”, “No”} default button “No” with icon caution

if the button returned of the result is “Yes” then
set theFiles to (get every item of theFolder)

repeat with i from 1 to count of theFiles

set oneFile to item i of theFiles

set the name of oneFile to ((random number from 1 to 1000) & (the name of oneFile) as text)

end repeat

end if

end tell

By: Dick Franks

Dick Franks — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 03:15:14 +0000

Very useful!

On a recent trip my wife and I each took 400 photos using our two cameras. Now I can place the 800 photos in the same folder without a Duplicate Name conflict, such as IMG_1234 being created by each camera. It also allows quick identification of the author.

Like Randy, I’m inspired to get further acquainted with Automator.

By: Gary Rosenzweig

Gary Rosenzweig — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 21:48:00 +0000

You should be able to do that with AppleScript, yes. But I’m not sure of the exact code off the top of my head, sorry.

By: Randy Clark

Randy Clark — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 21:46:12 +0000

Great Automator tip! I’m a long-time Mac user, but have never gotten into using AppleScript/Automator but this might inspire me to finally jump into it. One related question to this tip: is there any way either thru Automator or some 3rd party Mac apps to re-name a bunch of files RANDOMLY? I frequently add new photos to my digital frame’s SD card, and while the frame supposedly has a random-display mode, it’s never worked. I’d like to take my photo files for the digital frame and randomly rename the files (using number prefixes). I’ve searched several times over the past few years to find some way to easily accomplish this on a Mac, but failed to turn up any viable options. Any ideas?