LB Rename

Commands / LB Rename

16 May, 2018

Tags: command, help, support, v.7.0

by vlad

Functionality

Renaming of multiple Library items in 3 different modes:

Adding of Prefix and/or Suffix to the names of Library items.
Trimming the names of Library items by a specified number of characters.
Finding and Replacing specific characters.

Suggested use

To quickly and easily rename multiple Library items.

Where does it work?

Library panel

EDAP Tools shortcut

Alt+L

Known issues

Apply and Cancel buttons missing at the bottom of the dialog. This can happen on Mac OS if screen resolution is 1280x800. The vertical resolution is too small to fit in the whole dialog and the last section does not render. Dragging the dialog up will not resolve the issue due to a bug in how Flash / Animate create XUL dialogs.
Workaround: Increase screen resolution to at least 1440x900. You will then see the whole dialog.

Video demonstration

All our videos are 1080p. If for some reason full HD is not available here, try watching them on YouTube.

This command is part of the Flanimate Power Tools package. Get the latest version from Downloads.

Liam

30 August, 2019 at 9:11 pm

This tool and enumerate does not seem to work on mac. The popup menus for both are broken since the "apply" and "cancel" button do not appear so the action can't be confirmed or cancelled.

nick

30 August, 2019 at 9:19 pm

Can you, please, be more specific about your OS, version of Flash/Animate, etc.
We have tested on High Sierra and Mojave and all tools work.

30 August, 2019 at 10:10 pm

Thanks for the reply. Yeah I'll send over all that information as well as a screenshot to the info at flash-powertools dot com email.

I would send it here but I don't know how to send a screenshot here.

The tools are amazing by the way, you guys are awesome!

30 August, 2019 at 10:13 pm

Thanks, mate!
Yes, an email with a screenshot would be most helpful to try and troubleshooot.

30 August, 2019 at 11:08 pm

Nick helped me work through the problem and it's solved now.

Changing the resolution on the screen fixes the problem.

Thanks Nick!

31 August, 2019 at 12:30 pm

Thank you for reporting this, Liam!

I have now added it as a 'known issue'.

Visitor000

9 November, 2019 at 9:13 pm

I want to batch rename for folders
However, LB Rename doesn't seem to change the name of the folders.
It seem to change only name of items.
Is there any manipulation I missed? Or is it a limitation?
If you know any other solution please let me know 🙂

9 November, 2019 at 9:23 pm

Note : I am using win10, AN cc version 20.0 (build 17400).

9 November, 2019 at 9:26 pm

Yes, unfortunately for you LB Rename only renames Library items, but not folders.
This is by design. Folder names are excluded, while these folders can be used as group selectors, source for prefixes and so on…

However, it is a good idea and we will discuss batch rename of folders for our next release.

For the time being, I'm afraid, you will have to do this manually.

9 November, 2019 at 10:44 pm

I want to tell you a little bit more about my situation.

I have 2 fla files with directories like below.
A.fla
folder A \ symbol A, folder C \ symbol part of A
B.fla
folder B \ symbol B, folder C \ symbol part of B

Instances of Symbols A and B are on the stage of each fla file.
If I copy them and paste them into C.fla I get the following:
C.fla
folder A \ symbol A, folder C \ symbol part of A, symbol part of B
folder B \ symbol B

I expected the following result:
C.fla
folder A \ symbol A, folder C \ symbol part of A
folder B \ symbol B, folder C \ symbol part of B

From this, it seems that AN is sensitive to the name of the subpath.
So I decided to name all the folders differently, but there are already so many folders.
Manually editing them is a challenge.

I would be very happy if you add the option to rename folders in the next release.

9 November, 2019 at 11:48 pm

Hi mate,
Will think about your situation and may post again soon, if I have any ideas.

10 November, 2019 at 12:20 am

Hi again, mate,
I could get the desired result by dragging the Library folders from one file to the other.

Here is how to do it:

Open a duplicate Library view by clicking on this button:

Choose the other file's Library. Then drag the container folder:

The result is preserved folder structure:

Hope this helps!

10 November, 2019 at 1:23 am

Oh! I didn't know if I could open multiple library windows.
The drag & drop method between the library windows is very fresh for me.
It's also free from subpath problems!
I will use this method very much in the future.

Unfortunately, my animation team doesn't like to see the library window. They want to manipulate the things they see on the stage.

But in the end I have to work with my teammates so I can't force them to look in the library window right away.
In other words, I have to adopt a method of copying symbols from the Stage, and I need the ability to batch rename folders to avoid subpath problems.

I still hope the folder name option will be added in the next release of LB Rename.

10 November, 2019 at 9:59 am

I understand.
We definitely will consider adding folder batch renaming.

Just as a side note, have you looked at Duplicate Symbol Recursive? If folder structure is not important to you and all you need to avoid are Library conflicts, this command in combination with LB Rename may provide an alternative route.

10 November, 2019 at 1:14 pm

I knew about Duplicate Symbol Recursive in EDAP Tools.

Duplicate Symbol Recursive has excellent performance on design variations, but seems to be useful in some one animating situation.
But since I'm in a slightly different situation, I need to make batch change to costumes for multiple anim symbols of character and I'm already using other methods.

Every situation is enormous, so to sum it up I am applying a circular workflow to my team :
1. Set 'Anim symbol LIB.fla'
2. Sequencing anim symbols from LIB into 'Scenes.fla'
3. Return variation and new anim symbols from 'Scenes.fla' to the 'anim symbol LIB.fla'

Through this process, we want to increase the amount of LIB to reduce the amount of animators directly animating as we move towards the end of the series episode.

Thank you for considering the solution for me.
With EDAP tools, my team's workflow is getting growth.

10 November, 2019 at 3:46 pm

You are most welcome!

Glad to know that you and your team are finding the tools useful.

Will post in this thread when we have an update on the topic.

Good luck with your project!

17 November, 2019 at 5:13 pm

Hi again, mate!

Just a quick update on the folder rename functionality request.

We looked into it and discovered a long-standing bug in Animate that is present as far back as Flash CS6 at least, which makes adding this functionality impossible at the moment.
We will report this to Adobe soon. If and when they fix this bug, we will proceed with making batch folder renaming possible.

I will notify you, if that ever happens.

Mayank Anand

13 November, 2019 at 5:18 pm

Hi Nick, Can you please tell me how can i rename assets in library of Adobe Animate CC. Please guide me

13 November, 2019 at 5:27 pm

Hi Mayank,

Can you see the video, mate?

It's all shown there.

Make your selection of the items in the Library and then call LB Rename command.
In Animate CC you may need to click outside of Library panel in order for the shortcut [Alt+L] to work (this is a bug in Animate) or you just choose LB Rename from the Commands menu.

22 November, 2019 at 5:24 pm

I noticed that working with () and [] in the Find and replace function of LB Rename works differently than I expected and soon realized that this meant regular expressions.

So I used the escape character \ to get the result I wanted, but it can be confusing for users without programming experience.

Of course, you can't talk long about regular expressions to artist-oriented users.
However, I think it would be beneficial for them to find a prompt to put \ before each parenthesis when finding and replacing () and [].

However, I think it would be helpful for them to have instructions on put \ before each parenthesis when finding and replacing () and [] on this web page.

22 November, 2019 at 11:54 pm

Hi mate,

Thanks so much for reporting this!
You are absolutely right about the regular expressions.

We will try to fix the interpretation of the input so that the 'escaping' is done internally and not known to the user.

Thanks again!
We really value your input

23 November, 2019 at 8:03 pm

Hi again, mate,

We have just updated the EDAPT installer. This is silent so version is still v.5.0.0.1.

"Find and Replace" now will work with (), [] and other special characters as expected.
Please, download and reinstall on all the machines that might need this fix applied.

Hope this helps with your work!

nadia.IT

8 April, 2020 at 6:22 am

Hi nick
Thanks for the tool ..
I don't know where the problem :
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1TxnxW8ST7cXVfbGdk9mpiPenmlJP9Jv3/view?usp=sharing

8 April, 2020 at 7:42 am

Hi Nadia,

Thanks for posting!

What you see, rather what you do not see, must be this dialog, which basically tells you that you cannot continue with the rename, because there will be a naming conflict, i.e. you will end up with names that are the same.

For some reason on your computer the dialog does not render properly and you only see a little portion of it.
Just click on the [X] button to close it and then reconsider your choice how to trim so that you get valid names.

At this stage we really have no idea why the second dialog does not render properly and will try to investigate.
If we find anything I will update this thread.

One question: Were the symbols that you were renaming using Unicode characters such as Arabic or were they with Latin (i.e. English) names?
Thanks!

ps. I tried with some Arabic text and noticed that left and right trimming are swapped, so if your symbol names are in Arabic try to fill in the number in the 'left' box.

11 April, 2020 at 5:58 pm

Many thanks for your kind response
I speak Arabic.
But I use the English language in animate
Because times the program does not support the Arabic language
The tools are nice but need to be practiced by us in order to master them
If a part of free files is added to the site
Like effects, games, or open source programming for beginners like me
The site will be useful to everyone
many thanks

11 April, 2020 at 6:39 pm

Thanks very much for the additional details, Nadia!
I thought you might be using English, because the character file you sent earlier was in English.

Unfortunately, we have no idea what may be causing the dialog to not display correctly. We do a lot of testing and have never seen this happen, but a few months ago another user was having a similar problem.
We posted here and on Facebook in hope that someone will tell us more about the specific circumstances.

As for the rest, we really stay focused on character animation and developing the tools and don't have the resources for anything else.

All the best!

Pedro Fontes

5 February, 2021 at 2:40 am

Is there a way to rename layers with the same system as LB Rename?

5 February, 2021 at 7:23 am

Unfortunately not.
LB Rename, as the name suggests, is for batch renaming of Library items.