An AppleScript to replace spaces (‘ ‘) with underscore (‘_’) in names of files selected in the Finder. It does not do folders, but should be easy enough to modify so it can.
It does display a prompt with the file names as a list, so processing a mountain of files may not be ideal since AppleScript dialogs have the unwelcome habit of pushing the top (the only place you can grab an AppleScript dialog) and bottom (where the buttons are) past the edges of the screen when they contain enough text. Although ‘OK’ and ‘Cancel’ can still be activated by return and Command . respectively.
[UPDATE] Removed some redundant text in repeat routines, and switched to “my text item delimiters”.
(*
http://strawhousepig.net/
Portions of this script from:
Replace Text In Item Names
Copyright � 2001 Apple Computer, Inc.
*)
tell application "Finder" to set the_items to selection
set name_list to ""
repeat with i in the the_items
set this_item to i as alias
set this_info to info for this_item
repeat 1 times
if folder of this_info is true then
exit repeat
--set this_name to "(Folder) " & this_name
end if
set this_name to name of this_info & return
set name_list to name_list & this_name
end repeat
end repeat
if name_list is not "" then
display dialog "Replace spaces with underscores in the following files?" & return & return & name_list
else
display dialog "Please select files first."
return
end if
repeat with i in the the_items
set this_item to i as alias
set this_info to info for this_item
repeat 1 times
if folder of this_info is true then
exit repeat
end if
set the current_name to the name of this_info
-- replace target string using delimiters
set my text item delimiters to " "
set the text_item_list to every text item of the current_name
set my text item delimiters to "_"
set the new_item_name to the text_item_list as string
my set_item_name(this_item, new_item_name)
end repeat
end repeat
on set_item_name(this_item, new_item_name)
tell application "Finder"
--activate
set the parent_container_path to (the container of this_item) as text
if not (exists item (the parent_container_path & new_item_name)) then
try
set the name of this_item to new_item_name
on error the error_message number the error_number
if the error_number is -59 then
set the error_message to "This name contains improper characters, such as a colon (:)."
else --the suggested name is too long
set the error_message to error_message -- "The name is more than 31 characters long."
end if
--beep
tell me to display dialog the error_message default answer new_item_name buttons {"Cancel", "Skip", "OK"} default button 3
copy the result as list to {new_item_name, button_pressed}
if the button_pressed is "Skip" then return 0
my set_item_name(this_item, new_item_name)
end try
else --the name already exists
--beep
tell me to display dialog "This name is already taken, please rename." default answer new_item_name buttons {"Cancel", "Skip", "OK"} default button 3
copy the result as list to {new_item_name, button_pressed}
if the button_pressed is "Skip" then return 0
my set_item_name(this_item, new_item_name)
end if
end tell
end set_item_name
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This script could be tightened up some. Maybe I’ll get right on that…