Rename Screen Shots AppleScript

November 26, 2015November 26, 2015 Mike Hudson

Working in a support role means I spend alot of time using the built in OS X screen capture facilities, which generally means I end up with hundreds of Screen Shot ****.png files scattered all over my desktop.

Today I started working on the AppleScript below, which I have set as a folder action on my default screen capture folder.

It’s far from complete, and is definitely a current project, however I thought I’d share it at each stage.

To change your default screen capture directory, launch terminal and run the following command

defaults write com.apple.screencapture location /screencapturepath/;killall SystemUIServer

-- Apple Script to rename screenshots as they drop into a special 'hot folder'
-- Author Mike Hudson (aka MikeSel - https://www.mikesel.info)

on adding folder items to the target_folder after receiving these_items
    tell application "Finder"
        repeat with i from 1 to the count of these_items
            set this_image to item i of these_items
            if the name of this_image starts with "Screen Shot" then
                set theName to the text returned of (display dialog "Rename the image to" default answer ".png")
                set the name of this_image to theName as string
            end if
        end repeat
    end tell
end adding folder items to

-- Apple Script to rename screenshots as they drop into a special 'hot folder'

-- Author Mike Hudson (aka MikeSel - https://www.mikesel.info)

on adding folder items to the target_folder after receiving these_items

tell application "Finder"

repeat with i from 1 to the count of these_items

set this_image to item i of these_items

if the name of this_image starts with "Screen Shot" then

set theName to the text returned of (display dialog "Rename the image to" default answer ".png")

set the name of this_image to theName as string

end if

end repeat

end tell

end adding folder items to

Would you do it differntly? Have an improvement to suggest? Drop me a note below.

Bulk folder rename AppleScript

July 14, 2015July 14, 2015 Mike Hudson

I was recently approached by one of my blog readers John Ott, to help out with a bit of a technical challenge he had. John used a fairly complicated filing system for keeping track of lots of documents, blue prints and photos for projects him and his team work on. This included many subfolders with deep subfolders following a strict naming convention. When John starts a project, he used to copy and paste his top-level folder, then work his way through all its subfolders updating the folder names with the new project code. John reached out to me to see if I could help out, so I put together this Bulk folder rename AppleScript which takes user input for source and destination folders and the latest project code, it then traverses the folders and their subfolder and updates the names as required.

-- Apple Script to copy and rename a folder structure and its subfolders
-- Author Mike Hudson (aka MikeSel - https://www.mikesel.info)

tell application "Finder"
    
    set JobName to text returned of (display dialog "Please enter five digit code:" default answer "ST1234")
    set templateFolder to choose folder with prompt "Please Choose Template Folder"
    
    set fldName to name of templateFolder
    
    set newName to my replace_chars(fldName, "ST000", JobName)
    
    set destinationFolder to choose folder with prompt "Please Choose Destination Folder"
    
    set newFolder to duplicate templateFolder to destinationFolder
    set pro_folder to newFolder
    set all_pro_folders to every folder of pro_folder
    log all_pro_folders
    repeat with parent_folder in all_pro_folders
        log parent_folder
        set child_folders to every folder of parent_folder
        
        repeat with current_folder in child_folders
            set grandchildItems to every item of current_folder
            repeat with grandchildItem in grandchildItems
                set greatgrandchildItems to every item of grandchildItem
                repeat with greatgrandchildItem in greatgrandchildItems
                    set fold_name to the name of greatgrandchildItem
                    log (fold_name)
                    set new_name to my replace_chars(fold_name, "ST000", JobName)
                    set the name of greatgrandchildItem to new_name
                    log (new_name)
                end repeat
                set fold_name to the name of grandchildItem
                log (fold_name)
                set new_name to my replace_chars(fold_name, "ST000", JobName)
                set the name of grandchildItem to new_name
                log (new_name)
            end repeat
            
            set fold_name to the name of current_folder
            log (fold_name)
            set new_name to my replace_chars(fold_name, "ST000", JobName)
            log (new_name)
            set the name of current_folder to new_name
            
        end repeat
        set fold_name to the name of parent_folder
        log (fold_name)
        set new_name to my replace_chars(fold_name, "ST000", JobName)
        log (new_name)
        set the name of parent_folder to new_name
    end repeat
    
    set pro_folder's name to newName
end tell

on replace_chars(this_text, search_string, replacement_string)
    set AppleScript's text item delimiters to the search_string
    set the item_list to every text item of this_text
    set AppleScript's text item delimiters to the replacement_string
    set this_text to the item_list as string
    set AppleScript's text item delimiters to ""
    return this_text
end replace_chars

-- Apple Script to copy and rename a folder structure and its subfolders

-- Author Mike Hudson (aka MikeSel - https://www.mikesel.info)

tell application "Finder"

set JobName to text returned of (display dialog "Please enter five digit code:" default answer "ST1234")

set templateFolder to choose folder with prompt "Please Choose Template Folder"

set fldName to name of templateFolder

set newName to my replace_chars(fldName, "ST000", JobName)

set destinationFolder to choose folder with prompt "Please Choose Destination Folder"

set newFolder to duplicate templateFolder to destinationFolder

set pro_folder to newFolder

set all_pro_folders to every folder of pro_folder

log all_pro_folders

repeat with parent_folder in all_pro_folders

log parent_folder

set child_folders to every folder of parent_folder

repeat with current_folder in child_folders

set grandchildItems to every item of current_folder

repeat with grandchildItem in grandchildItems

set greatgrandchildItems to every item of grandchildItem

repeat with greatgrandchildItem in greatgrandchildItems

set fold_name to the name of greatgrandchildItem

log (fold_name)

set new_name to my replace_chars(fold_name, "ST000", JobName)

set the name of greatgrandchildItem to new_name

log (new_name)

end repeat

set fold_name to the name of grandchildItem

log (fold_name)

set new_name to my replace_chars(fold_name, "ST000", JobName)

set the name of grandchildItem to new_name

log (new_name)

end repeat

set fold_name to the name of current_folder

log (fold_name)

set new_name to my replace_chars(fold_name, "ST000", JobName)

log (new_name)

set the name of current_folder to new_name

end repeat

set fold_name to the name of parent_folder

log (fold_name)

set new_name to my replace_chars(fold_name, "ST000", JobName)

log (new_name)

set the name of parent_folder to new_name

end repeat

set pro_folder's name to newName

end tell

on replace_chars(this_text, search_string, replacement_string)

set AppleScript's text item delimiters to the search_string

set the item_list to every text item of this_text

set AppleScript's text item delimiters to the replacement_string

set this_text to the item_list as string

set AppleScript's text item delimiters to ""

return this_text

end replace_chars

You can download a zipped up copy of the above script by clicking

If you’ve a project and you’d like to see if I can help, get in touch using my Contact Form.

How to monitor a folder for changes

July 1, 2014July 8, 2014 Mike Hudson Leave a comment

OS X comes with somewhat of a hidden feature straight out of the box. That’s the ability to fire AppleScripts on folder actions. Those actions could be anything from files being added, changed or deleted from a folder.

This can be handy if you need notification of when a file has finished downloading or need to rotate log files etc.

AppleScript is a powerful language, which to the beginner may even seem quite daunting. Luckily there’s a script all ready and waiting which notifies you of folder changes.

To switch on this feature, navigate to the folder you’d like to monitor. Now pull up the context menu (right click) and select folder actions setup.

From here select the ‘add – new item alert.scpt’

Once added, you have the opportunity to modify the Apple Script should you wish. If you are happy with the notification popup, simply close down the open windows and wait..

That’s all there is to it really, if you need something a little more advanced, you’ll have to break open the AppleScript editor. Or post a response below, and I’ll post a tutorial on how to do what you need!

Send an iMessage with an AppleScript

July 8, 2013May 18, 2014 Mike Hudson 9 Comments

I don’t like waiting around for long processes to finish on my Mac, so I was recently hunting for a way of sending push notifications to my iPhone/iPad.. I gave up after a while, realising that nothing seemed reliable enough.. So then I changed tact, and that’s when I came up with this AppleScript. This uses OS X’s built in message’s app to send an iMessage to my mobile!

tell application "Messages"
	set intid to get id of first service
	set myRecipient to myRecipient "+44123456789" of service id intid
	send "Your full machine backup has now completed" to myRecipient
end tell
tell application "Messages"
	quit
end tell

This could quite easily be built into Automator Workflows etc.

Unhide the Library folder in Finder – AppleScript

August 2, 2012May 16, 2014 Mike Hudson Leave a comment

By default the ‘Library’ folder is a hidden folder in OS X Finder. However, if you need temporary (GUI) access you can use this simple AppleScript below to remove the ‘hidden’ flag from the folder.

tell application "System Events"
	set libvis to (get visible of folder "~/Library")
end tell

if libvis = false then --~/Library is currently invisible
	tell application "System Events" to set visible of folder "~/Library/" to true
else --~/Library is visible
	tell application "System Events" to set visible of folder "~/Library/" to false
end if

This script could also be easily amended to show and hide any folder of your choice, simply by replacing the ~/Library/ with the path of the folder you’d like to toggle.

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AppleScript

Rename Screen Shots AppleScript

Bulk folder rename AppleScript

How to monitor a folder for changes

Send an iMessage with an AppleScript

Unhide the Library folder in Finder – AppleScript