Folders and sub-folders

Great app !
I'm thinking of buying it, but something important is missing for me, the ability for Hazel to applicate the rule inside folder and sub-folders.
ie : i have folder B and C inside folder A, inside B and C i have files with different family colors. I want Hazel to move from folder A all files (so Hazel have to look inside ALL folders and sub-folders of folder A) with green family colors to trash (for example).
Thanks

Hi,

Actually, this was one of the more requested items during the beta so it's one of the top items for 1.1.

I'm still working out how to present this in the interface but the way I am thinking of it now is that it would be an action in a rule. That way, you can filter which folders are descended into since there are cases where you don't want this. One such case is when you unpack an archive. You probably don't want Hazel to scatter all those files.

Hope this makes sense. If it doesn't then maybe I need to rethink it.

Thanks for the feedback.

I would also like Hazel to check the subfolders as well. But need to turn it on or off per rule.

When will v1.1 be available? (days, weeks, months...)

Any idea what the impact on performance would be? E.g. on a server.

Right now, I'm shooting for 1.1 in about a month. I will also post an announcement here for beta testing when it gets to that point.

What kind of server is it? The Hazel background process is set to a lower priority (both in CPU and in disk usage) than normal tasks but if it's a mission-critical, high-usage server, you may want to try it first (maybe during off-peak) to see for yourself.

One setting, securely deleting files from the Trash, is very resource intensive so this should not be used if the performance impact is a concern. Note, though, that in Hazel, securely deleting has less of an impact than if you use Finder's "Secure Empty Trash" option. In some cases, Finder's version renders my Powermac unusable whereas under Hazel it is noticeable but I can still do other stuff.

I notice that this feature did not make it into 1.1. A very nice little application, but the lack of sub-folder creation and ability to apply rules to the contents of those sub-folders is a deal-breaker for me. Labels for new files, old files etc, are nice, but not nearly as helpful as sorting into sub-folders, by date, name, kind, etc. It sure would be nice to label files within sub-folders: not read, old, etc.

As it stands, I have an AppleScript that creates a new folder inside 'Downloads' every time that a first download occurs on a particular date, labels the folder with the date, and adds that download and all others added on the same date. What I lack is the labeling within subfolders, ongoing monitoring, error checking for duplicates. These are all the strengths of Hazel. I will come back and check in the future for updates.

Note that if the subfolders are static (do not need to be created on the fly), you can just create them yourself and set up rules to move stuff into them.

A feature is slated for 1.2 where you can dynamically create a folder based on attributes of the file. With the holidays and other things going on now, it's hard to say when a beta will be available but check back here periodically.

Mr_Noodle wrote:Note that if the subfolders are static (do not need to be created on the fly), you can just create them yourself and set up rules to move stuff into them.

Thanks for the reply. The static subfolder point is a good one. I will watch out for an update, nevertheless.

This thread is quite old, but it seemed most relevant to my question: my download manager will automatically unarchive files to a directory name based off the archive name if I want it to. I end up with the following sort directory layout:

Code: Select all: Downloads \_ 123.zip _ 123 \_ file1.ext _ file2.ext

I really want Hazel to process my "Downloads" folder for *.jpg and be able to tell it to also check the dynamically created "123" folder, or any others that appear under "Downloads".

Is that achievable currently in Hazel?

It's described here http://www.noodlesoft.com/faq.php#U8. Basically, you create a rule to match the folder(s) you want to descend into, and use the "Run rules on folder contents" action. Have another rule that actually matches the files and processes those.

Thanks. I had read about that in the help file but wasn't quite sure I grasped how it was supposed to work. Your explanation cleared things up, though!

Okay, next thing (sorry)...

I have a set of rules acting on folder "Chimera". That folder is the same level as "Downloads" shown in my previous post.

I have added a rule for "Downloads" that says: if kind is folder then run rules on folder contents.

Is this only going to run the rules for "Downloads" on its sub-folders? If so, does that mean I have to manually drag all my rules from "Chimera" to the "Downloads" folder, which copies them, meaning any updates to rules have to be updated twice[1]? :-/

Thanks for your patience with this.

[1] I could create different rules, to move the relevant files into "Chimera", and then let the rules for "Chimera" take over, but even that seems a bit inelegant. I feel I'm missing something.

If Chimera and Downloads are both in the same folder, you could monitor their common parent instead. You could tweak the rule to only descend into those folders if need be.

And it's not necessarily inelegant to have rules for one folder move stuff to another folder which has its own rules. For instance, you could have rules in the Pictures folder that do more specific filing but folders outside of Pictures only have to worry about putting stuff in Pictures.

For now I've gone the route of moving from Downloads to Chimera to let them be processed by the rules governing that folder, as to move the ones I'm interested in requires far fewer rules in this case.

Thanks for the tip about monitoring the parent, though; that didn't occur to me.

"Run rules on folder contents" doesn't seem to descend into each subfolder. F'rinstance, I have a "My eMusic" folder on my desktop where all my mp3s from emusic.com land. I have a rule:

if name is My eMusic
run rules on folder contents
import into iTunes

But it's not working. Could this be because the folder structure is really:

Code: Select all: My eMusic \_ Minutemen \_ Double nickels on the dime \_ track 01.mp3 _ track 02.mp3

[/code]

There are a couple issues here.

The rule you have matches a folder and the "Run rules on folder contents" operates on folders which is fine on that front. The import action, though, should be in a separate rule as it operates on the files inside. Have it match against the mp3 extension or do "Kind is Music".

The second part is that your rule only matches the top folder ("My eMusic"). When it descends, that rule will not match "Minutemen". I'd recommend adding "My eMusic" to Hazel specifically and set the rule to match any folder ("Kind if Folder").

So, in the end, the rules would look something like:

Folder: My eMusic
Rule 1: If Kind is Folder, Run Rules on Folder Contents
Rule 2: If Kind is Music, Import into iTunes

Also, if you are running the latest alpha, I broke the iTunes importing. I'm releasing an update tomorrow that should fix it.

Let me know if this makes sense or if you need any other assistance.