RenameCommand

A library making it easy to make a swift command-line program for renaming files according to your own rules.

Details

This package exports a struct RenameOptions conforming to the ParsableArguments protocol from Apple's ArgumentParser. It's intended to be used with @OptionGroup() and your own ParsableCommand and provides a runRename() function you can call within your own run(), implementing all the boilerplate file system and string processing involved in a command that renames files. Your code is little more than your custom regular expressions or any such manipulation of the base filename.

runRename() takes a function argument with a inout name String (and file extension String), you provide this function which changes name as desired. This is called for every file passed on the command line, with the directory omitted and file extension separated, and the file gets renamed accordingly. Leave name unchanged (or change to empty string) to do nothing to the file.

RenameOptions defines arguments --verbose/-v, --quiet/-q, --dry-run, --try (not to mention the defaults provided by ArgumentParser, --help/-h and --generate-completion-script). The difference between --dry-run and --try are that the former fails as usual if the file arguments aren't found, the latter will allow any file argument as if they were files that existed; both show the would-be results of the rename without carrying it out.

It works well with swift-sh, also the sharplet/Regex package which RenameCommand extends with an overload of its String extension functions allowing you to more conveniently specify case insensitive. See below.

Example

With swift-sh installed, this simple Swift "script" source file "myrename" (no ".swift" extension needed) is all you need to give you a fully functional custom file renaming command:

#!/usr/bin/swift sh
import ArgumentParser // apple/swift-argument-parser
import RenameCommand // @jpmhouston
import Regex // @sharplet

struct RenameMoviesCommand: ParsableCommand {
    static let configuration = CommandConfiguration(abstract: "Renames my ripped movies from their old name format to how I prefer them now.")
    @OptionGroup() var options: RenameCommand.RenameOptions
    
    func run() throws {
        try options.runRename() { name, _ in
            name.replaceAll(matching: #"\."#, with: " ")
            name.replaceFirst(matching: " 720p", .ignoreCase, with: "")
            name.replaceFirst(matching: " 1080p", .ignoreCase, with: "")
            name.replaceFirst(matching: " ([0-9][0-9][0-9][0-9])$", with: " ($1)")
        }
    }
}

RenameMoviesCommand.main()

The functions replaceFirst and replaceAll are from sharplet/Regex. If your script uses this package too, you're also able to pass options such as .ignoreCase to those shortcut functions as shown rather than having to construct a Regex yourself to provide those options.

Thanks to the magic of swift-sh, after a chmod a+x myrename and moving it to somewhere in the shell command path like /usr/local/bin, you can then do:

$ myrename --help
OVERVIEW: Renames my ripped movies from their old name format to how I prefer them now.

USAGE: myrename [<files> ...] [--quiet] [--verbose] [--dry-run] [--try]

ARGUMENTS:
  <files>                 Files to rename. 

OPTIONS:
  -q, --quiet             Suppress non-error output. 
  -v, --verbose           Verbose output (overrides "--quiet"). 
  --dry-run               Show what would be renamed (overrides "--quiet", no files are changed).
  --try                   Try hypothetical file names (overrides "--quiet", no files are changed).
  -h, --help              Show help information.

$ myrename ~/Movies/Die.Hard.1988.720p.mp4
'Die.Hard.1988.720p.mp4' renamed to 'Die Hard (1988).mp4'

Tip for fish shell users

If you use the fish shell, add this selection function and you can rename the current Finder selection with simply this:

$ myrename (selection)

(exercise for the reader: make something similar that works in other shells)

See Also

• ArgumentParser
• swift-sh
• Regex
• Files