OS X :: How To Add Current Date To Automator Save File Name
Jun 23, 2010
I have an automator script I made myself that I use constantly. When I run the script one of the steps takes a screenshot and saves it as a PNG file. When I run the script again, it replaces the old PNG file with a new one. I would really like it to save the PNG file so that file name begins with the current date at the beginning of the name. Meaning the PNG file would be named something like "6/23/10 screenshot". Is this possible?
I'd be almost as happy if I could at least get it to simply make a new PNG with any random filename just so long as it doesn't overwrite the old version. That way I could simply look at the date created column in the finder and get the same info.
I'm a new Mac user and was just reading about "Automator" My question is would it be possible to create a workflow etc, to save an excel or word file to two different locations or directories?
I have a fairly big photo library in iphoto 09 and I am wondering if there is an option to save information like location, description, date etc to the actual picture file. The reason I ask is because when I went to export some pictures it didnt save any of this information whatsoever and with 4000 photos thats a lot of work to go add all that information back to. Anyone else have experience with this?
I'm new to the Mac world but have been successful in creating a few Automator workflows to simplify certain tasks. However, I'm stuck on the flowing; I'd like to create a workflow that searches a particular folder for items created 30 days before today's date and the delete them. I'm assuming I need to create a variable of today's date and then subtract 30 days from it and so on. Haven't been able to figure this out.
I have a folder where I place an ever growing collection of my favorite songs. Before I switched to Mac, on Windows, when I wanted to revisit songs I most recently added to the folder, I would sort the songs by the Date Modified and it would order the files I placed in the folder by date.
In OSX, however, there must be a slightly different meaning to "Date Modified," as it does not quite sort my songs by the order they were added. It gets some of it right, but there's plenty of files that are out of order--tune "x", which I know was placed in the folder a week ago is actually listed further down the list with songs placed in the folder months ago.
Is there a way to have OSX sort files in order of the date it was placed in a folder? Neither "Date Modified" nor "Date Created" works 100% as I thought it would. Or is the OSX definition of Date Modified/Created slightly different than Windows?
I have a workflow that I use often. Is there a way to add it to the library? I added a folder called My Workflows, but can't save any of them to that folder.
I am new to automator. I'm working on a Powerbook G4, in osx.4.11, and I'm trying to save a workflow as a plug-in in automator. When I click file>save as plug-in, nothing happens. I get no pop-up, and no plug-in is saved. I've tried this with various workflows.
I'm also having trouble adding actions to the workspace (even ones that make sense to add, i.e. I am following a tutorial to create a workflow that others have made before).
While I like the Top Sites feature in Safari, does anyone else wish that Safari would allow you to quit, with an option to save all the current websites that you are currently on, just like Firefox allows you to. Top sites is a cool feature, but it doesn't save the particular site in the form you left it. It basically just opens that page by refreshing it to its current form. I realize that you can save a page in web archive, but it would be a cool feature that Safari could add in a future update.
In mid august i received an update notice to update my macbook pro, i updated to safari 7.0.6...since then when i scan on my photsmart D110, my scanned photos do not transfer to iphoto. I am receiving a message about files be not readable.
I'm working on an Automator Application which would expand a Rar-archive full of pictures, and turn those into a PDF.This I got working, but now I want the output PDF to be named as the rar-archive's filename that I use as Application input. I tried around with some variables, but just couldn't manage to get the Application working in the end.How do I get the Application to name the output PDF like the input?
I have a large collection of files that I'd like to run through Automator to batch edit some qualities of these pictures. However, these images have been submitted from multiple people, moved around, and just "existed" for long enough that some of the files have lost their file extensions. The problem occurs when I try to run them through Automator. Everything runs fine until it comes across a file without an extension, then it stops, and displays an error message. Does anyone know a way around this in Automator? Does an Applescript exist that would be able to add these file extensions back in?
I am very new to automator, but relatively savvy with macs and such. Having a strange problem where an Automator file action to rename a file with a sequential number is only working one time. The second time a new file drops into the folder, nothing happens. If I edit the Automator File Action, change the number to a new higher number, it will work one more time, and then not again.  The basic task is to rename a file with a new text and sequential number each time a file is dropped or saved to a folder. I am using a slide scanner, and the default image file that is saved is called 'untitled' each time. Having this work would let me automate the entire scanning process to one click...Â
Info: iMac, Mac OS X (10.6.8), 3.06 Intel Core 2 Duo
I'm kind of new to Automator and I'm trying to come up with a sequence that will severely save me a few hours a day moving files from two larger folders into smaller folders. Basically the setup is that I have two folders, one constantly being populated with images and the other with video files. They each have file names starting with a two digit number (i.e. 12, 11, 10...) or "BG" and then a two digit number (i.e. BG12, BG11, BG10...) with the digits corresponding to a year. Essentially, I'd need to move the files into folders corresponding to the year (i.e. files starting with BG12 and 12 would be moved to 2012, files starting with BG11 and 11 would be moved to 2011, etc). As it stands now, I've only been able to get the 2012 folder populated.
Just put together a CV using Open Office, it's currently saved as a .odt. I'll be sending this out to a few companies and I'd like to know what the best file type is to select that will be readable by everyone? When I go to 'save as' I see a long list of options and I'm not sure which one to pick so that PC users can view.
I try to open an Open Office spread sheet and it simply saves the file as another file with the .cpgz extension which does the same thing. This did not happen a couple weeks ago; I think my download for Apple updates may be the culprit. My OS X is now 10.7.3, I believe originally it was 10.7.2 but I could be wrong.Â
The original document is a zip archive but now "saves as" a .cpgz archive. I have tried the "Unarchiver", which I just downloaded, but it only creates another file with subfolders, none of which appear to have my original spread sheet. (To be honest, I never noticed this Open Office spread sheet file was a zip file until a few minutes ago when I tried to unsuccessfully open it).Â
I've set up an Automator to batch rename files. The renaming works fine. The problem arises when it renames a file which doesn't contain it's extension (a common MacOS practice). Is there some way to make sure it preserves the filetype? For instance, this works fine:Â
Original:
Output:
 And this results in an error:Â
Original:
Output (file type has been replaced with generic "document" type)
Pre-Lion the way to see the path of the file you are currently looking at (in any app, but for simplicity let's say TextEdit), was to select Save As... and it would default to the directory the file is open in. At least that's the way I did it...Â
So now in Lion (which I generally like) how do you see what directory your current file is located in??Â
I have a simple automator sequence that suddenly stopped working for no apparent reason. Copy Finder Items has started returning an error "the file xxx couldn't be saved to the folder yyy" Happens for different files and folders. Can't see anythng that's changed.Â
Info: MacBook Pro (15-inch 2.4/2.2 GHz), Mac OS X (10.7.3), iPad, iOS 5
I can't seem to find a way to alter the creation date of a file. I have a project and mid-way through I copied everything into a new file to test something out. It's in a different format so it's impossible to simply port it back to the original file.
I have files with no creation date or creation date 1969, etc (came from bad settings in camera).
Since I knew the date, I was able to easily fix it via touch:
touch -t 20090110 IMG_1023.JPGÂ
This used to set creation, modification, and access time to 20090111, in Snow Leopard.  However, I can no longer do this in Lion. It does set modification and access, but creation date is still screwed up.Â
Info: macbook pro 2007, Mac OS X (10.7.2), iPhone 3GS, 4, iPad2, latest iOS5
I wasn't paying attention when installing the windows XP and I choose the "Leave the current file system intact" option and I am unable to boot up my IMac. Its a black screen saying failing to boot from cd, press any key to reboot and it doesn't. I have ejected the cd and I been trying to hold down the option button to choose which to load up from but it doesn't work. I have an external hard drive that I been using for time machine, is there any way I can boot up from that disc and then have the hard drive in the IMac reset to the mac OS X partition? Running Mac OS X Leopard to its fullest updated on Intel core duo IMac with 2 gigs of ram
My question is how to handle the difference in creation date between the paper document and the scanned file. The paper files are from the past 50 years, but of course the file creation date of the scans is the date of the scan. How can I reconcile this? Ideally I would like to make the scan metadata creation date of the PDF/A the same as that of the original paper file creation date.
I'm trying to add time/date stamp to my screen capture file names. (at the moment it's just 'Picture 1' etc..)I've tried the following command in terminal but have not had success.
defaults write com.apple.screencapture name "datestamp" at "timestamp"Â
Normally, a Folder "Date Modified" does not change unless the folder itself changes (name, etc). Is it possible to "force" a Folder "Date Modified" timestamp to change when an enclosed file is changed/updated? I want to look at a folder and know the date/time of the latest enclosed file/folder change. This is especially important to me when using syncing apps as I want to visually see by a folders date that a sync has occurred (the actual file change may be deeply nested within the folder.)
Figured it would be a little lighter to have a thread that shows that Apple's computer CAN and DO work occasionally....Here's my uptime on my i7! It wants me to reboot for Safari update, but I refuse. As of 8:42am PST, March 16, 2010:I guess currently I have the longest uptime of anyone in this thread!
