Image Capture - Increment Filenames for Scans

[NZ_MacGeek]

I have a situation where where I want to scan items using a Konica printer/scanner using Image Capture but I cannot find a way to have it automatically increment filenames so that existing files are not over written. The default scan name is 'Scan' and this will overwrite the existing file unless I manually put in a different name for each scan, ifs the a way to have Image Capture automatically append a number to each scan so that they do not overwrite previous scans.

 

[Slydude]

This can probably be fixed fairly easily with an Automator workflow but I don't exactly have time to experiment with that at the moment.

 

[ferrarr]

Are you sure it overwrites the old file?

 

[MacInWin]

I have not done that is a while, but I seem to remember that the first file is "Scan" and the second is "Scan (2)" and the third "Scan (3)" and so forth. Have you actually tried scanning a couple to see what names get suggested?

 

[Slydude]

I didn't think of that when I posted earlier. It has been a while since I did this but I'm pretty sure you guys are right.

 

[NZ_MacGeek]

Are you sure it overwrites the old file?

It will do sequential files within one session but when you start the application again it will start from the filename 'Scan' again and adds extra pages to the file but I will do further testing

 

[NZ_MacGeek]

Update: My posts are slightly incorrect, what happens is the following:

If you scan documents as single pages then the do indeed create files where the filenames increment - but if you then chose to scan multiple pages as. 'combine in to a single document' it will append those pages to the first file name ie. 'Scan' rather than create a new document. I would rather have this create a new document automatically but can't see any way to do this.

 

[MacInWin]

But "combine into a single document" carries with it the requirement that the "document" have ONE name. One file, one name. You cannot name the pages within a document. What is it you are really trying to accomplish? I'm totally confused by your posts, sorry.

 

[NZ_MacGeek]

But "combine into a single document" carries with it the requirement that the "document" have ONE name. One file, one name. You cannot name the pages within a document. What is it you are really trying to accomplish? I'm totally confused by your posts, sorry.

What I would like is for the scanned document to use the next available file name. It makes no sense to me that I can a few documents as single pages over a few days eg Scan, Scan (1), Scan (2), a day to two later I do Scan(4) and Scan (5) but then I want to scan a multipage document in to a single file and what happens then is that rragther than creating a new file Scan (6) is instead adds the pages to the file called Scan

 

[MacInWin]

When the software goes to save the file to the drive, it looks to see if there is a file by that name already, and if so, it will ask if you want to keep both (usually) and if you say yes, will adopt the numbering structure. So, if you scan 5 documents on Monday, they should be named Scan, Scan (1), Scan (2), Scan (3) and Scan (4). Then if you scan two more on Tuesday, they should be named Scan (5) and Scan (6) IF YOU DID NOT MOVE OR RENAME THE FILES YOU SCANNED ON MONDAY. Yes, that was for emphasis. The numbering does NOT come from the scan software, it comes from the file saving process and only works if there is a name conflict where you want to save. Frankly, it's a bit of a trick and not how the scan software is designed. As far as the scan software is concerned, it's naming the files all "Scan" but the OS is not allowing the overwriting (because you said not to do that), so the OS is renaming the files with numbers to keep them separate. The scan software is unaware of what the OS is doing.

But the multipage process is INTERNAL to the scanner. So if you scan the same five files on Monday, then on Tuesday want to scan into a multipage document with the same name, the scan software opens the "Scan" document (assuming that's the name you gave for this multipage document) and then puts the new images into that file, just as you asked. If "Scan" already exists, the scan software opens it and adds the new pages, as you said to do. But what you WANTED was to have those new images in a separate file, which requires that you now create a new name, let's say "ScanMultiple" and put the multiple images into that document instead of adding them to Scan. The OS doesn't renumber this document because it has been properly opened and then saved back with the same name, so no name conflict.

You are asking the software to read your mind about what you want it to do, which it clearly cannot do. You have to be explicit in telling it what to do with the images it scans. That's just how it works. The trick of letting the system renumber them is a hack, and it works reasonably well, as long as you don't move the previous files away. If you move or rename them, there is no name conflict and the trick doesn't work.

I don't know exactly what you are trying to accomplish another trick you can play is to set the scan name to the date of the scan, for example, 2020-10-10 for today and then let the OS add the numbers so you end up with 2020-10-10 (2), 2020-10-10 (3) etc. Tomorrow you would change the name to be 2020-10-11 and end up with 2020-10-11, 2020-10-11 (2), etc. The good news here is a sort by filename will sort them to scanned order, if that is important to you.

 

[NZ_MacGeek]

Thanks for that explanation, I'll have to find another way of setting the scanning up - perhaps I can add an environment variable to add the data and time to the filename or something similar.