May 18
once in a while you re-explore a project only to find that it’s nearly impossible to find things, items are missing and it’s a complete mess. everyone from the programmer to the photographer can benefit from having a consistent file naming and folder structure system in place. rememember you don’t have to do it like we do. use whatever works for you, stick with it, and modify it over time.
May 19th, 2008 at 2:25 pm
Would like to warn other listeners that when John says the Unix command for rename is “rm”, he really meant “mv”. rm is remove.
May 19th, 2008 at 2:33 pm
that joke never gets old you know…
May 19th, 2008 at 9:12 pm
When you guys say to buy new HDs instead of deleting projects, do you have any special (physical) storage systems for these old drives? Wouldn’t you also need to clone every drive and have two drives for every drive you archive (incase one fails when you try to spin it up a year later)? Just curious for if I do this myself.
May 20th, 2008 at 10:07 am
You guys probably work on much bigger projects than I do. Mine are accounting, finance, and legal documents related to real estate.
One comment put me in my place: it is stupid to put a date in a file name.
Indicted and convicted.
Why do I stupidly put dates in file names? Because coming from Windows I remember (at least I think I remember, it was pretty long ago now) that the file date changed every time I opened / edited a file. Or someone else did. When exchanging drafts of legal documents, I find it very, very useful to have a file date that can’t escape!
I also find it useful to be able to sort files by date, in, for example, a folder containing PDF scans of financial documents. I LEAD such files with the date and, lo, they tie right back to the accounting program — and if the system clock goes berserk, my dates are safe.
re - extra hard discs for project backup - wasn’t it on this podcast I learned that hard discs stored in a closet have to be taken out and spun up or they won’t work when needed?
— so many podcasts, so little brain
May 20th, 2008 at 11:50 am
This Episode was awesome! Partly because it was the first in a while, partly because….it’s macbreak tech, and finally, it addressed that people all have to deal with.
Also, I don’t know how you did it, but i barely noticed that Craigs sound quality was off, it was a bit off, like someone forgot the extra-thick pop filter or something, but until you mentioned it, i had NO idea that Craig was at a remote location. How did you do it?
Shash
June 3rd, 2008 at 2:19 am
I know this is probably a noob question but where are the show notes?
what are the drawback to using automator to set up file structure?
June 3rd, 2008 at 8:40 am
writing the notes takes WAY longer than producing the show. I haven’t had all the time in the world this last week. thus… no notes.
the disadvantage of Automator is that sometimes you just can’t make it do something. and because you can’t easily script it you get stuck. AppleScript will give you way more control for making a file structure. so that’s a plus side. but it’s harder to learn. I’d say, try it in Automator first then move away from it if you can’t make it work for you. Hope that helps. - john
June 4th, 2008 at 11:57 am
“ƒ” is for folder
As a designer creating tons of collected folders for output, I’ve been using this trick forever. It works great to show at a quick glance a folder sent for output.
Option f
For example: Awesome Design ƒ
No need for “output” whatever. Just throw that on the end. In fact, InDesign puts the word “folder” at the end of the package. Just delete it and type in ƒ.
Stupid but simple.
June 11th, 2008 at 5:26 am
# Character should be avoided as well. Not that it is a problem on the mac but if your files are to be shared over SMB its a no no.
July 24th, 2008 at 3:39 am
I blogged about this in response to the show. Love the show by the way, keep up the good work.
But on the issue of the date… I disagree.
http://www.tinyplanet.eu/?p=191