Batch rename files under Windows/MacOS/Linux - Andy's Blog

Description

Batch rename files in a directory under Windows, MacOS and Linux.

Usage

Command Prompt Command (used for Windows)

ren * *.jpg

• ren is short for “rename”, it’s the command used to rename files.
• * represents a wildcard character that matches any sequence of characters in a file name.
• *.jpg specifies the new name pattern for the files. In this case, it renames all files in the current directory by changing their extensions to “.jpg”.

batchRename.bat

@echo off
setlocal enabledelayedexpansion
set i=1
for %%A in (*.mp4) do (
    ren "%%A" "Tom_And_Jerry.!i!.mp4"
    set /a i+=1
)

• @echo off: This command turns off the command echoing, so it doesn’t display each command in the batch file as it’s executed.
• setlocal enabledelayedexpansion: This command enables delayed environment variable expansion, which allows you to use variables within a loop.
• set i=1: This initializes a variable i with a value of 1.
• for %%A in (*.mp4) do (...): This loop iterates over each file in the current directory that ends with .mp4.
• ren "%%A" "Tom_And_Jerry.!i!.mp4": This renames each file, appending a prefix “Tom_And_Jerry.” followed by the current value of i and “.mp4” extension.
• set /a i+=1: This increments the value of i by 1 for the next iteration of the loop.

Bash Command (used for Unix-liked systems MacOS/Linux)

i=1; for file in *.mp4; do mv "$file" "Tom_And_Jerry.$i.mp4"; ((i++)); done

• i=1; initializes a variable i with a value of 1.
• for file in *.mp4; is a loop that iterates over each file in the current directory that ends with .mp4.
• do marks the beginning of the loop body.
• mv "$file" "Tom_And_Jerry.$i.mp4"; renames each file, appending a prefix “Tom_And_Jerry.” followed by the current value of i and “.mp4” extension.
• ((i++)); increments the value of i by 1.
• done marks the end of the loop.

Reference

• ChatGPT

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