Noodlesoft Forums

Hello! I am brand new to Hazel, as of about 45 minutes ago. I have never used Hazel and have an overwhelming and \ immediate need is to organize related documents into one folder per client, instead of having these files scattered all over the place. I tried to find a rule to copy here in the Support section but was not successful. I am hoping someone can get me started by telling me what rule I might use to do this, or pointing me in the right direction. My set up is as follows:

Each file is named with the client's name plus info on the document. For example, for client Smith, files would be named:

Smith analysis
Smith cost estimate
Smith invoice 9-3-2012
Smith contact info

Some clients have hundreds of files. And some clients have folders resulting from various efforts to organize related documents, such as folders like:

Smith 10-2012 documents
Smith 11-2012 documents
Smith 12-2012 documents
Smith 1-2013 documents

What I want is a rule that will search everywhere on my hard drive for a file that starts with Smith or a folder that starts with Smith, and for all of that to be dumped into one folder on my desktop (Smith Main Folder). But I want the documents I've already organized into folders (such as Smith 10-2012 documents) to remain inside those folders before the folders are moved to the main folder.

I can further refine the search by year because most projects last only one to four years, so Hazel won;t have to reach back to the 1930s to find what I am looking for.

Can anyone help me? Thank you (more than you will ever know!)

This is going a bit outside of Hazel but I suggest searching around on how to use Spotlight. Here's an Apple support article to get you started: http://support.apple.com/kb/ht2531