attachment rename question

[mwarner]

I am in the process of dragging over many pdf files into a new Bookends library and do not understand what determines the behavior of the Rename options. Specifically, I'm selecting to attach each ref and run autocomplete first with the hope that a web of sci search will grab the ref. info. However, sometimes the option to pull the pdf name is from the web and it works great, while other times, the option listed the actual name of the pdf file that I am dragging over. How/can one get the auto functionality all of the time? Now, I've ended up with 50 or so attachments with names like 6.pdf which was not my intent.

[Jon]

Hi,

Look for Bookends 11.0.5 in a week or so. It has several new flexible attachment renaming options, one that deals with this exact scenario.

Jon
Sonny Software

[dspady]

I downloaded the latest Bookends yesterday, and looked for various ways of naming attachments when importing them but nothing really stood out.
What I want to do is to have AS THE DEFAULT that the attachment name is the title of the document, rather than the Author Date. It is pretty useless to look at a folder full of Author,Date filenames when you are searching for one with a specific topic. So, how do I do that.

Many thanks

Don Spady

[Jon]

It's there, in Preferences. Pick a format you want Bookends to use to create the name. Obviously a journal format isn't appropriate, but you can easily use the Format Manager to create your own. For example, if you wanted the title name, you'd enter just

t

in the Order field.

Jon
Sonny Software

[dspady]

Yes, I figured that out shortly after I put in my query. HOWEVER, it is such an obvious choice that I am surprised that Bookends doesn't give it as an option, instead of just defaulting to author, year.

Don

[Jon]

It wasn't obvious to me (author-date was), and no one has requested a "canned" title rename option. It would be easy to add that as a listed option, but of course it's easy to implement by the user in a format, too.

Jon
Sonny Software

[Jon]

Hi,

I've added "rename by title" as a Preferences option in the next update. It will use up to the first 128 characters in the title.

Jon
Sonny Software

[talazem]

Sorry to revive an old thread...but where is this choice in the preferences of 11.1.3? Under "Rename attachments", I don't see the built-in "rename by title" choice.

I've made my own user format in the format manager, but there is no way there (that I can see) to clip the number of characters at 128 or some other number for purposes of the file system.

[Jon]

Odd, it was added in 11.0.6 (and in the end it would use the first 220 characters). But I don't see it in 11.1.3, either. I don't know what happened, but I'll have to restore it in the next update.

Jon
Sonny Software

[Jon]

I've made my own user format in the format manager, but there is no way there (that I can see) to clip the number of characters at 128 or some other number for purposes of the file system.

You don't have to -- Bookends will clip the file name for you (to 220 characters, if I recall correctly). So make a format that just outputs the title and use that.

Jon
Sonny Software