I've been internally grumbling about these things for quite some time now, but
a recent thread reminded me to actually try to do something about it, so here goes...
MC's Rename, Move, and Copy Files tool is incredibly powerful and useful, but there are a few things I'd love to see that would make it dramatically more useful and powerful. More importantly to me personally, these things impact my current workflow and make it clumsy. These needs revolve primarily around limitations when using MC in a client/server environment, as you'll see.
1. AutomationRight now, the only effective way to apply these changes is manually while sitting at the console of the server. This was not a major issue in the past because you'd almost always want to add tags manually before applying filesystem changes anyway, so you'd be there at the console. Over the years though, a few things have changed such that you're no longer always at the console when these tagging changes happen, and in many cases, they are fully automated. By this I'm, of course, referring to Carnac (automatic filename parsing on ingest), Automatic Metadata lookup, and Tag-on-Import, though you could also include the older changes of allowing manual tagging from the client-side and the presets/profiles in Rename, Move, and Copy.
As it stands, for the VAST majority of new files my systems auto-import on a daily basis, all the metadata needed for determining the destination (long-term storage) filename is already available moments after import. But, until I remember to manually sit at the server's keyboard and click through the dialogs, the filesystem changes aren't made. This results in a huge backlog, in most cases.
I'd like a command line option where I can apply a particular (named) Rename, Move, and Copy preset to a given Playlist or Smartlist, so that this can be scheduled to run daily/hourly/weekly or however I'd like via the Windows Task Scheduler. I'm thinking something like:
mc19.exe /rename <preset name> <playlist path>2. Client-Side AccessAnother issue is that running MC in a client-server environment means that you can only access this powerful tool while sitting at the console of the Server. This is troublesome if you are running the server on a VM or headless box, or some other similar setup. Or, even in a "more common" setup (where maybe your HTPC is the server), there are often instances where you'd like to be able to apply changes
to the server's filesystem from another connected copy of MC. It seems like the coming "Linux stuff" would serve to make these needs much more common (a linux-based server in a NAS or something won't provide easy access to the MC UI).
Likewise, the Rename, Move, and Copy Files tool would be incredibly handy for creating local copies of files on a client. Yes, you can drag-drop the files from MC to your desktop on the client to create a copy, but then you lose any metadata "embedded" in the filesystem structure. It would be very handy to be able to use the Copy function of Rename, Move, and Copy to create local copies of files on a client machine, with all of the normal tag-based "filename manipulation" available. I'd use this a TON on my laptop. And, combined with the Automation option above, it could be a powerful "backup and duplication" system as well.
If accessing this via MCWS is the main limiting factor, I don't see a problem with only allowing this access when the client in question has direct (network storage) access to the files in question, much like the existing Play Local File when One That Matches feature works.
3. Name Filtering PatternsThe last thing I need is admittedly a bit more specialized in my case, but I think with the current OSX version and the coming Linux stuff, this would also be a "Very Good Thing" to target for general use as well. It is easiest to explain by relating my specific use-case...
I use MC at work to manage content on two Wowza Streaming Servers. These servers provide Video-on-Demand for our public and Internal websites, and they do an awesome job, but they provide no mechanism to manage the filesystem structure or file metadata at all. So, I point MC at the servers' /content/ directory and use it to manage the files there (which gives me metadata, auto-import, search, and all sorts of other handy tools). However, since these files are being embedded in HTML, the filesystem path of the files cannot contain spaces in any way (or any other character not valid in a URL), or the address of the file will be an ugly mess.
So, in order to use tags to define "folder structures" via Rename, Move, and Copy in MC, I have to carefully and manually ensure that the tags I use contain no spaces. And, I have to ensure that no other user uploads new content into the system with a space-containing filename (which is challenging, as you might guess).
It would be wonderful if Rename, Move, and Copy could have a setting to automatically apply things like CamelCasing or Replacing_Spaces_with_Underscores, and other similar "filename cleaning rules". This could, if needed, be accomplished with a few additions to the existing Clean() expression functions, and tagging trickery, but I think considering the differing filesystem conventions of OSX, Windows, and Linux, it would be more useful to have the feature "built into" the Rename, Move, and Copy tool itself in some way. If the user is "serving" from Linux, but wants to ensure the filenaming structure will work as-is on a Windows box as well, this would be an essential function.
Thanks, in advance, for any consideration.
Even one of these for MC19 would dramatically improve my workflow in a ton of places. All three would be a dream!