KRename: a Batch Renamer

Posted Jul 8, 2004 15:28 UTC (Thu) by mrshiny (subscriber, #4266) [Link]

First, it works with io slaves, so that means it can access files that aren't on your filesystem. This is transparent to the tool but not transparent to your shell script.

Second, what happens when someone who doesn't know how to write a shell script has to rename lots of files? Personally, I hate having to dust off my shell script skills whenever I need to do something that's not possible any other way. Shell scripts have their place, but if I can get done what I need to do with a few clicks it saves me lots of time reading the bash man page. Just because I know how to program doesn't mean that I want to write programs every time I want to do something.

Third, Krename supports file metadata plugins that are already present in KDE. This means you have access to lots of things that aren't necessarily visible in your shell. Sure, someone could write a command line tool that extracts that info, and maybe there is such a tool for some types of files, but do all of those tools have the same interface? Or does your trivial shell script have to massage the output from these tools differently for each tool?

I'm glad to see that someone has helped automate a task in a user-friendly manner. I'm looking forward to trying out krename. It may come to replace the tool I currently use to rename photos that I download from my camera, and it may also end up helping me with my movie and mp3 collection.

Posted Jul 8, 2004 15:42 UTC (Thu) by openhacker (subscriber, #1614) [Link]

But I've been using an application called mmv (posted to
comp.sources.??? in the late 80s) which has been very handy...

Shell scripts/loops also work...

marty