Noodlesoft Forums

I've had Hazel since about V5 just mainly to go through and sort incoming files to folders. General stuff. All is ok with that. I do however have a ton of folders with files related to Genealogy. These files have been OCR'd and put into general folders e.g. census, registers, possible relatives etc.

I have read/ re-read/ re- re- re- read the new subfolders help thing. Instead of music and films, it seems to be what I am looking for.

Would you agree?

If so, then I am not too sure what I am doing wrong. The files have names in their extensions and the OCR produces its own set of tokens (I think I have the terminology correct?). I have used both in the rules e.g extension contains Wyild is 1 rule then another is file contains Allen (I've checked the OCR thing and it does). I then followed the rest of the stuff on the subfolders info page (updated one with script)

There are 2 things

1. To test I opened a new test folder to see if they would go in there - they did not, I am not sure why.

2. If I wanted this to work on all my genealogy folders and not just one using the subfolder depth thing. Is this not actually possible? e.g use Research folder as the one I upload the subfolders get sorted via the command(s) on the main folder -I am trying not to have 40 folders on hazel.

If I am trying the wrong way to do what I want to do, can some kind soul point me in the right direction? I spent 16 hours yesterday either in this forum or on you tube trying stuff - and failing.

Thank you in advance - Linda

Can you provide a concrete example of what you want to do and a screenshot of your rules?

Mr_Noodle wrote:Can you provide a concrete example of what you want to do and a screenshot of your rules?

*Edited this post isn't formatting how I thought it was to show level of folders/ subfolders but I hope you get the idea*
Research Folder-
-------- Subfolder A
-------- Subfolder B
-------- Subfolder C
etc Some have their own subfolders in

Subfolders contain OCR PDFs/Images with specific names eg Allen/ Wyld

(I hope you're with me so far)

I want the *named ones only* to then go into their own named folder eg above names would go in folder called Allen or Wyld. This folder is in

Research Folder
----------- Family Names
-------------- - Surname Male Line
---------------- - - Allen
---------------- - - Wyld

And no - In a fit of exhaustion and upset I deleted the rules but to give you an idea I followed your format on
https://www.noodlesoft.com/manual/hazel ... ubfolders/
But instead of Music or Pictures it was pdf's in a subfolder with specific key word e.g Allen and set the subfolder depth to greater than 0.

Can you re-create your rule(s)? It's easier to go off of what you are trying to do than to guess.

Mr_Noodle wrote:Can you re-create your rule(s)? It's easier to go off of what you are trying to do than to guess.

Hopefully I've uploaded the images correctly. This is 1 of the 2 ways. The other way I tried was putting my rules and the go into subfolder rules as 1 rule but that did not work either.

*seems I cannot upload images from my computer.....not sure what to do now

Use imgur.com.

Mr_Noodle wrote:Use imgur.com.

I couldn't work that site out.

Ok, this should work





*naturally it didn't!

lets try this..using pasteboard for images so you'll need to click on the link.

https://pasteboard.co/ICjZ7lfD7Ns9.png

https://pasteboard.co/KlZPnfDZlTuJ.png

Your first rule looks a bit odd. For one, you are matching against PDFs but then also matching on sub-file/folder count. PDFs do not have sub-files/folders. Also, I think you want the "Contents contain Allen" condition underneath the nested condition otherwise this will only match if the file contains both Allen and Wyld.

If you have a long list of names, it might be better to use a custom list attribute instead. That way, you can enter the list and just have one condition to match anything that is contained in that list.

Mr_Noodle wrote:Your first rule looks a bit odd. For one, you are matching against PDFs but then also matching on sub-file/folder count. PDFs do not have sub-files/folders.

Not sure I understand - although I agree it's all wrong hence my first post. I thought I was having hazel look into the subfolders for the pdfs, I'm not asking the pdfs to look for subfolders.

A custom list - I found that one the other day by sheer chance. I agree it looks as though it would be great for my use BUT will it do what I need it to do and that is, in a nutshell, move named files (imagine 250 different names) to another folder of their name e.g Allen pdf to Allen folder/ Wyld pdf to Wyld folder - bearing in mind - all these pdfs are in different subfolders of the main research folder?

Basically I want to do this:- https://pasteboard.co/8TfOPw0aNQmU.png

1. in all the subfolders of that level, which I think I now have correct - but with other names - without having to repeat the rule x- amount of times for each name.

2. The folder I want them in is not the one shown (that's just for the purpose of this image) but one with their matching surnames.

I hope I've made that more clear.

I've found half of what I wanted to do using this viewtopic.php?f=3&t=14986

Edited to add... The idea from the link above this line did not work - even though the preview rules thing matched

If things looked ok in preview then you need to check other things. Go through the whole troubleshooting guide here: https://www.noodlesoft.com/kb/hazel-tro ... ing-guide/

Mr_Noodle wrote:If things looked ok in preview then you need to check other things. Go through the whole troubleshooting guide here: https://www.noodlesoft.com/kb/hazel-tro ... ing-guide/

I did all that before coming here to ask the original question. It's ok, I'll re google and see if I can find something.

Post the results from the troubleshooting. I can't really help if you don't provide that.

Mr_Noodle wrote:Post the results from the troubleshooting. I can't really help if you don't provide that.

There are no results. I enabled debug mode clicked the 2 boxes and nothing happened. I tried again today with something else. I did a simple move an image from a folder to put into another folder and nothing.

Post what you see anyways. Plus I need results for the preview and rule status.