Enter RegName, a free Open Source program for Windows to rename multiple files in a directory easily. It can for instance be used to change the name of a series of photos you want to rename, log files, videos that you have created or any other kinds of files.

You can either start the program directly and switch to the folder that stores the files that you want to rename, or you can use the Windows Explorer integration to do the same. Just right-click in Windows Explorer on the folder that stores the files you want to rename and select Rename files using RegName to launch the program with that folder preselected.

Regname is supporting regular expressions to match and rename file names. The basic match pattern is set to . which would catch all file names in the folder that have a period in their file name.

You can then use those values again in the replace pattern if you like. Jerusalem-. would for instance add Jerusalem in front of the existing file name and extension (as the example looks at a folder of photos taken in Jerusalem).

But regular expressions are way more powerful than those basic examples. You can completely rewrite the file name or use information from the existing file name.

The preview button is handy as it allows you to verify that the new file names will look exactly as you want them to look. A click on Rename finally runs the rename operation on all files that match the pattern.

RegName comes with a command line version that you can use as well. The most interesting option besides the ability to use the command line version in batch file operations is the ability to rename files in sub-folders as well, something that is not possible with the gui version of the program.

Windows users can download RegName directly from Codeplex. Be advised that the program requires the Microsoft .NET Framework 2.0. The program is compatible with all recent 32-bit and 64-bit editions of the Windows operating system.

The software is available as a portable version, command line version and installer for 32-bit and 64-bit editions of the Windows operating system. The benefit of the installer is the option to integrate the program into the Windows Explorer context menu for easier root folder selection.

The main screen is packed to the brim with settings that all define the renaming process. The developers have sorted the renaming options into 13 different steps that are indicated by numbers displayed in the interface.

It begins with the selection of a root folder; The files that are stored in the folder are shown on the right side along with information such as file name, new name after the renaming options have been processed, file type, size and various other information.

The new name column acts as a preview so that it is always clear how the resulting file names will look like.

The various renaming options may look intimidating at first, users who have worked with the program for a while however will have no troubles configuring the options in short time, especially since only the required options need to be configured.The criteria are processed from left to right indicated by numbers.

Lets take a look at the individual renaming options:

• RegEx, Use regular expressions to match part of or all of the file name to replace it. Option to include the extension in the rules available.
• File, Option to keep, remove, reverse or use a fixed filename for all items.
• Replace, Simply replace option to replace text
• Case, Change to lower, upper, title or sentence case.
• Removals, Remove chars from the names, many different options.
• Move / Copy, move or copy part or all of the filename to a different location.
• Additions, add suffixes or prefixes to the file name. Supports several EXIF and ID3 tags
• Auto Date, add a date prefix or suffix to the file name
• Append Folder Name, append the folder name to the file name
• Numbering, sequentially number a group of files.
• Extension, Change the case of the extension, e.g. lower, upper case or title.
• Selections, add file filters, hidden files, include subfolders, or specific minimum and maximum length of files to rename.
• New Location, copy or move the renamed files to a new location.

Additional options have been added to the program, they are available from the Options menu at the top. Noteworthy features include changing file attributes, timestamps and character translations.

Bulk Rename Utility has a few other aces up its sleeve. It can for instance rename files from a text file, remove accented characters, sort files randomly or display images in the built-in picture viewer.

The program is very sophisticated and at the same time straightforward to use once the initial “omg this looks messy” reaction ends. The developers state that the program has no problems handling folders with more than 100,000 files in them, and that it can batch rename 1,000s of files in seconds.

Interested users should start with the introduction of the program on the developer website. The excellent pdf manual explains every setting in the program interface, it is therefor recommended to download the manual to have it at hand during the first few times the file renamer is used on the system.

The download page lists 32-bit and 64-bit downloads, as well as the pdf manual and downloads for the portable and command line version. Bulk Rename Utility is compatible with all versions of Windows from Windows NT to Windows 7.

Panda Batch File Renamer offers an intuitive interface to rename photos, music, and general files. Files can be added from the clipboard or with the help of the built-in file browser. The files are then displayed with their folder path, original file name and final file name. The display options menu at the top offers options to add or remove parameters from the table. It is for instance possible to add meta data to the table.

The program updates the final file name whenever renaming options are added, edited or removed from the application.

The available renaming options are grouped into the four pulldown menus Insert, Replace, Remove and Other.

Options range from adding, replacing or removing text to adding information from meta tags if available. It is for instance possible to add the date or location photos were taken to the file name (if they exist of course). Multiple renaming options can be selected and positioned. It is possible to use drag and drop, and the Insert menu to select locations for each renaming option.

Each change is directly displayed in the program which can be used to verify the changes immediately.

Panda Batch File Renamer offers to save renaming patterns to make use of them at a later point in time. Especially the options to utilize file meta tags and the ability to save renaming patterns make Panda Batch File Renamer an interesting application.

The software can be downloaded from the developer website. It requires the Microsoft .NET Framework 3.5.

Rename Master’s interface looks and feels slightly more complicated than that of Caterpixer. The main reason for that are the buttons and options that are presented to the user in the lower half of the interface. The upper part consists of a file browser that is displaying the directory structure of the computer system on the left side and the actual files of the active directory on the right. A file filter is available to display only files matching a certain pattern. This is also the location where the new file names can be previewed before starting the renaming.

The lower part of the interface consists of four tabs that are used to configure the renaming. The scripting tab is the main tab in the renaming process. It contains ten options to rename the selected files which can be divided into options to add and remove characters. A click on the + sign in front of a filter will open the configuration menu of that filter. Any changes made to that filter will later be displayed in the overview as well.

A click on the preview button will display the new file names in the upper part of the interface next to the old names. The three additional tabs in the lower area of the interface can be used to configure case and wildcards, counting and text files that are used to rename files.

Windows users who want more control over the renaming process might want to take a look at Rename Master. The application takes more time to adjust to but rewards the user with better options to batch rename files in the operating system.

The computer software supports both renaming operations on file contents but also on file names and supports the use of the two wildcards (*) and (?). The interface of the application is tab driven and the user is working from the left tab to the right to configure the renaming operations. Source files will be selected in the first tab. This can be done by typing them in, pasting them in or using a file browser that unfortunately cannot load the contents of directories into the application. Files can be excluded by dates.

The next tab defines the file replacements. It is possible to define multiple strings to be replaced in here. The options in the third tab contain several important settings like matching only whole words, enabling wildcard use, case sensitivity or limiting the replacements.

The fourth tab contains logging options. A record log will be written by default which will log all operations. This can be changed to disable logging or to log only positive or negative hits. The batch tab is the final tab which allows to execute batch files before or after the operation.

File Substring Replacement Utility is compatible with all editions of Windows including Windows XP and Windows Vista. It can be downloaded directly from the developer’s homepage.

Update: Program is Shareware. Possible free alternatives are TurboSR, String Find & Replace or Replace Text.

Filters can be used to exclude or include files and folders. It is for instance possible to exclude hidden or system files from being renamed. Several different name manipulation rules can be added including adding, deleting, replacing or serializing characters.

Interesting is the support of various meta tag information that can be added to the filename. Supported are among others ID3, Avi, EXIF, IPTC, HASH and File information. This means that ReNamer can be used to rename photo, music or video collections with ease.

The screenshot above is demonstrating a basic renaming example. The first rule removes all characters with the exception of the file extension from the filename while the second rule adds the playing time and the file size as the name name for the selected files.

ReNamer can also be used to strip certain characters from files, cleanup file and folder names (remove brackets among other things) and transliterate non-English characters with English representations.

It provides furthermore access to regular expressions and Pascal Script for advanced renaming needs. Rules can be saved as presets that can be loaded into the application again at any time to perform the same renaming operations again.

The software is very responsive and definitely one of the best file renamers for the Windows platform.

The second tab is the Renamer tab which basically contains all the renaming options. The functionality in this tab is huge and it contains a few extras for certain file types that are worth exploring. The layout in this tab is a bit unusual. The upper left contains seven operations that can be selected: change length, directory, insert, modifications, move text, replace or swap. An operation is selected by either dragging and dropping or double-clicking.

Once at least one operation has been selected the menu of that operation becomes available to the right. The replace operation for instance contains in depth settings to replace text in filenames, folders and / or extensions. Several special operations are available in that menu. The application can read and make use of mp3 id3 tags and image meta information and use those information in the renaming process.

The options provided for every operation are very detailed and the user will spend most of the time in that tab to explore the various possibilities. Inexperienced users might feel intimidated by the amount of options while experienced users will love it.

That is not helpful if all file names should be named differently and renaming files individually would take to much time. Enter the batch file rename application Text to File Renamer. Text to File Renamer is a portable application that can speed up the file renaming process.

The user can drag and drop files into the left pane of the application and enter file names typed, pasted or entered by dragging and dropping a text file into the right panel. The lines should correspond and the user can use the right pane as a text editor to move names around so that each filename will be renamed properly.

When all lines correspond to each other a click on the Rename button renames all listed file names at once. The file extension is not listed because it will remain as is. The process is considerably shorter than renaming the files manually but the application could use a few automatic manipulation options to reduce the time it takes to enter the new filenames.

The functionality however is making more than up for it. First of all, PFrank supports wildcards and regular expressions making it an excellent tool for both beginners and advanced users alike. You might now wildcards from your operating system, they are normally substituted with the char *, a search for all mp3 files of a folder would look like this for instance *.mp3.

Regular expressions on the other hand offer a wider variety of meta characters suitable for advanced file matching needs, it is for instance possible to exclude files with certain chars.

Many pre-defined renaming rules have already been added to PFrank and it is rarely the case that users have to use their own regular expressions for a renaming process. Some of the popular filters already included are the filter to remove all non alpha-numeric characters, to add music information at the beginning or end of a file, to add numbers or chars to a filename, to remove all numbers and to insert other file information like file properties or folder information.

If none of the default renaming templates suit your needs you can create your own. The homepage of PFrank contains additional information and links to tutorials that explain Regular Expressions in greater detail, definitely worth a visit if you ask me.

With Renamer NG it takes only a few seconds. You start by selecting the directory that contains all the files that you want to rename. They are listed in the main panel afterwards. Now click on Operations > Replace. This opens a new menu with five options: Replace, With, Match Case, Before and After.

• Replace defines the characters that you want to replace with different ones.
• With are of course those characters that you want them replaced with.
• Match Case defines if your input is case sensitive
• Before displays how the filename looks like before the changes
• After shows how it would look like after the changes, both in realtime

This is the basic process. Renamer NG offers much more though. You can add more than one dir and additionale files, filter files, insert characters, use regular expressions and add the current date and time to the filenames. I’m not able to list all of the options but you have to believe me that there are plenty of them.

I especially like it that it is easy to use so that everyone will be able to change filenames. Computer Geeks on the other hand will love the additional renaming options such as regular expressions.