Sonny Software

HI,
I have recently migrated from Sente, and have successfully migrated a good number of my PDFs. However, a good number are orphaned. Another big chunk (~1000) appear to have come without a .PDF extension. As I want to index these in DevonThink, I want to convert these to PDFs. This is easily done as a bulk process using a mac utility. But then I have just created another 1000 orphaned files (despite being located in the same ICloud folder). Any ideas? Or am I stuck with hours of re-attaching PDFs
Thanks

You added the extension "pdf" in the Finder? If so, then of course Bookends can't find them (it matches by full name). Better if you had renamed them in Bookends with Global Change, so that Bookends could keep track of the new names. You could have created a format that renamed them with something like author and date, and added a fixed string, .pdf, to each name.

I haven't tried it myself, but a format something like

a d$.pdf$

You might try this with a single attachment that doesn't have a .pdf extension and see if it works as I think it will. If it does, you can remove the .pdf from the files (with whatever utility you used) and try this on the selected references. Make sure they all really are PDFs, of course, because you'll be making the Finder think that all the files are PDFs.

Jon
Sonny Software

Hi Jon,
Thanks for your quick reply. I haven't done them all yet, so I can certainly have a go at a Global Change. Stupid question: where can I set up the format for this change? All I see in the preferences is a drop down menu, and I can't see it in the Global Change drop down from the Refs menu.
Thanks again.

That would be Biblio -> Format Manager.

Create a new format based on an existing one and set up the order field as I indicated. Tweak the way you want the name and date output. Enable (check) the new format. In preferences, first tab, tell Bookends to rename using that format (select from the popup menu).

Try just one or two as an example first, to make sure it works as you want.

Jon
Sonny Software

Thanks - this is getting me close. I seem to have a punctuation issue -- ending up with a final period (.) at the end...hopefully I can track down why that is appearing!

I don't know, it works here. Check the name of the original file (do a Get Info in the Finder). See if it is just text, or if it ends with a period.

Jon
Sonny Software

Hmm. Still no luck here. The name of the original file ends with the period. I have no idea how these PDFs ended in this state. Perhaps a Sente quirk.

So it appears that this is an issue on my machine that received a synched version of the PDFs. (My laptop appears to have the proper pdf file extension). I may just try to start from scratch, reimporting all into Bookends (and hoping I don't end up with more orphaned files in the process! Thanks for all your help.

The period is the problem. When Bookends renames it keeps the old file extension (of course, or the files would lose their "identity"). In your case the extension is just the period, but Bookends leaves it.

I suspect there are utilities that would let you remove the periods in batch, but since you have PDFs with the proper extension it's probably best to start with them.

Jon
Sonny Software