Very long media file names

[LeoC2]

I have a problem that has come up that if it can’t be solved may prevent my further use of TF. I pretty much settled on TF to use by my judging staff. The form created includes a photo field with the picture being taken by the IOS device. Things have been working very well until…

I am now working on taking the exported TF data, both the CSV file and the photos folder, and importing them into a database program, Panorama, for further analysis. Big problem is that the names of the JPG images are so long that the database program will not display the images. When I manually shorten the name of a file and it’s reference in the CSV file the image displays. Typical file name for an image exported by TF is 654777EB-1E73-4DEB-9DE8-0783B86644C9.jpg, why so long?

Is there a way to have TF shorten these huge file names? Why are they so long? If the names can’t be exported in a shorter version I may have to move on to another forms program which I really don’t want to do at this point.

Leo

[Brendan]

Hi Leo,

The reason why they’re like that is because I am asking the operating system for a unique string to use as the file name. This is to make sure that the file names for the photos are globally unique. This is primarily to prevent collisions when syncing. If two devices generated the same file name and then you synced them, you could have two different images with the same file name and that would be a collision.

Thanks,

Brendan

[LeoC2]

From what i understand many programs cannot use that long file name, they still require no more than 31 characters. My database program, as I have found out, can convert the long file name to an alternate shorter unique name that is available in all these names. It only changes the data within itself but cannot change the actual file names since it still can’t read them.

Doesn’t the OS offer an option to use the 31 character file limit and still be unique?

[LeoC2]

To be clearer… I just used “A Better Finder Rename” and asked it to convert the file names to OS9 compatible names. I then ran a routine in my database program to use that OS9 31 character name.

This all works but is a pain in the neck to make everything work together.

So what i’m asking is… Can’t you have the OS generate an OS9 31 character unique name which is more compatible with much of the software out there?

[Brendan]

Hi Leo,

I just ask the operating system for a globally unique ID. It doesn’t give me the option to ask for just a certain number of characters. Yes I could truncate the result to 31 characters, but that wouldn’t necessarily be globally unique anymore.

Thanks,

Brendan

[LeoC2]

Branden, apparently there is a formula to convert the longer file names to an HFS compatible 31 character name and still be unique. The database program I use has a function that actually does this as I’ve just found out. I then use the shorter name to open the image on disk and it opens even though the image file still has the long name.

If this is the case your media files would then be compatible with all Mac programs old and new alike.

Leo

[Brendan]

I’m not sure what that formula is.

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