How it Works

Top Features

Search & Replace

Manual Processing Mode

In Manual Mode you explicitly select files for processing in a variety of ways. You can drag & drop files from Windows Explorer; paste them from clipboard; add all files from a given folder; add specific files by selecting them from a list; search for specific files that match given criteria; or paste file paths.

Additionally you can further refine the file list by unchecking the files you wish to temporarily exclude from processing.

When satisfied with file selection, you can then manually process the whole batch. Processing can be started as long as the file list contains at least one checked file.

Automatic / Background / Continuous Processing Mode

In Automatic Mode, instead of selecting specific files for processing, you setup "monitors" that tell the program which files should be processed and when. The processing is performed automatically and continually when the specified conditions are met and the program is in the active monitoring mode.

A monitor works by performing periodic scans of the specified folder(s) for all the files that match given criteria and satisfy monitor's behavior type (see below). All matching files that were found by the monitor are then put into the processing queue. Periodicity of the scan/check can be controlled and can range anywhere from 1 minute to several hours or even days.

Depending on the monitor behavior type, file processing may be initiated under different conditions:

  • File is Present - processing is performed on all files matching criteria located the monitored folder (same file may be processed multiple times unless destination and original file paths differ and the original files are deleted after processing).
  • File was Modified - processing is performed on all files that have been modified since the last time the monitored folder was checked.
  • New File was Added - processing is performed only on the new files that were added to the folder since the last time the folder was checked.

There is no limit to how many monitors you can setup — it only depends on the system resources that are available to you. The monitor setup can be easily saved to a template file for future use.

Once you have setup the monitors and actions, you can start monitoring and processing files. Unlike the Manual Mode, processing in the Automatic Mode can be paused, so you can edit both the monitors and actions in the Action Sequence, and then safely resume processing.

Automatic Mode is ideal for cases when your workflow involves continually working with small batches of files that are coming in periodically and require similar kind of processing.

Triggered / Scheduled Processing Mode

Triggered or Scheduled Processing Mode lets you define different processing jobs that can be executed on schedule or a particular trigger, such as: on every Monday at 2:00; at Logon; on a particular system event; etc.

The program does not need to be running for the processing job to be activated - it will be automatically started with the right command line parameters at the right time by Windows Task Scheduler Service (which needs to be enabled for this feature to work) and begin performing the tasks defined by the processing job.

Processing jobs are easily managed within the program, but should the need arise, you can also modify their properties in Windows Task Scheduler directly.

Batch File Replace can perform processing jobs in 3 different modes:

  • Command Line Mode - only the console window will be displayed.
  • GUI Mode - program is launched and performs processing displaying progress in regular Graphical User Interface.
  • Invisible Mode - no user interface of any kind is shown, and the processing job is performed in the background.

All processing jobs can be different: for every job you can specify not only the trigger or schedule that will determine when it runs, but also the files to be processed, actions to be performed, output file name pattern and directory, and a host of other options.

Hierarchical Action Sequence with Conditional Processing

Action Sequence

With Action Sequence you can easily specify which actions to perform on the selected files, under what circumstances, and in which order.

  • Drag & drop to add, copy, and move actions
  • Easily duplicate (copy) actions with all their settings
  • Toggle individual actions on and off
  • View a summary of action's settings right in the list
  • Perform certain actions only when specified requirements are satisfied using conditions
  • See condition relationships visually in a tree
  • Save action sequence to XML-based template file
  • Open / append previously saved action sequence
  • Save action sequence summary to text file
  • Get instant feedback about any errors
  • See selected action details in tooltips
  • Actions are numbered and color-coded to help you identify their order and distinguish different types of actions

You tell the program how to process files by adding various actions to the Action Sequence, which represents a sequence of operations to be performed step by step. In the Action Sequence, actions can be easily rearranged, moved around, duplicated using simple drag and drop operations and / or keyboard commands.

Conditions and Processing Paths

Conditional processing is possible with conditions, which are simply special actions that make sure that the actions that follow them should only be performed if particular requirements are satisfied: file name and file size match specified parameters, or a file contains certain text, etc. This results in potentially different processing paths for different files.

Actions and conditions are visually presented in the action sequence using numbered hierarchical tree-like list and arrows, making it easy to design and see processing logic and understand various relationships between the actions and conditions.

There is no limit to how many actions or conditions can be added to the action sequence, nor are there any restrictions as to how the actions should be ordered. Do whatever you need to accomplish your goals!

XML Templates

The action sequence that you design, including all the actions, conditions, levels of hierarchy, and individual action's settings can be easily saved to a file as XML-based template that you can reuse later. Because templates are XML-based, you can actually use any text editor or specialized XML tools to edit these templates afterwards. In addition, template files can be used for processing using command line and in Triggered / Scheduled Mode.

Processing Flow Branching and Conditional Processing with Conditions

Conditional processing allows you to perform different actions and operations on different files. This is accomplished using Conditions in the actions sequence, which alter the processing flow, so that different files may be processed using different processing paths!

Any actions that follow a condition in the action sequence will be performed only if the check(s) defined by the condition have been passed by the file being processed. Any actions nested inside a condition whose check(s) have not been passed by the files will not be performed on those files.

If another condition is encountered later, it may add to the effects of previously defined condition(s), so that any subsequent actions will be performed, provided the file being processed passes the new condition's check(s) as well.

  • 8 Built-in conditions that can check file properties and content
  • Conditions can be nested, which is equivalent to grouping conditions together using AND logical operator
  • Conditions can be grouped together using either AND, OR (inclusive OR), or XOR (exclusive OR) logical operators
  • Both the individual condition's check result as well as the check result of the whole condition group can be negated (logical NOT), which is useful when you want to apply certain actions to all files except those matched by the condition(s)
  • Nested conditions can have actions and/or layers between them to allow for complex hierarchical processing scenarios
  • Condition relationships with each other as well as hierarchy of actions they control is clearly reflected in an action sequence with arrows and alignment, so you know which actions and layers are controlled by which condition(s)

Full RegEx Support

Batch File Replace offers extensive support for Regular Expressions throughout the program:

  • 4 Regular Expressions Actions - RegEx Replace, Multiple RegEx Replace, RegEx Extract Text, RegEx Format Text
  • 2 Regular Expressions Conditions - RegEx Content, and Multiple RegEx Content
  • 6 Dedicated RegEx tools - Text Lines Selector, Text Selector, XML/HTML Tag Selector, Whole Number Selector, ASCII Character Map / Character Escape Selector, and RegEx Builder & Tester
  • RegEx Syntax Highlighting - all RegEx input text fields feature automatic syntax color highlighting, bracket matching, and interactive tooltips that make it super easy to design regular expressions patterns
  • RegEx Builder & Tester - helps you design and test Regular Expression patterns. With it you can also perform RegEx search and replace operations that support RegEx substitutions (that allow you to swap to pieces of text for example). It can also highlight matches in the original text, so you can better understand the behavior of your RegEx patterns.
  • RegEx-Based File Search - you can use Regular Expressions when searching for files whose names should match a specific pattern.
  • RegEx-Based File Rename - you can perform RegEx-based search and replace operations on file names, giving you advanced control over file naming.

Saving Processed Files and Output Options

When it comes to saving the processed files, the program offers a great variety of options: it gives you full control over destination folder, file name pattern, file attributes, and output modes.

Output Folder Options

You have total control over where the processed files should be saved. Output folder (directory) can be:

  • Original folder - processed file will be saved to the same folder where original file was read
  • Existing folder - existing folder specified using absolute path
  • Folder specified with Relative path - you can use relative paths to specify output directory: i.e. ..\Folder or Folder or Folder1\Folder2.

If a destination folder does not exist, it will be automatically created during processing.

Set File Attributes and Dates

As part of the processing you have the ability to set (if saving as new files) or modify/update (if original files should be altered) file's attributes and dates (creation, modification, and even access).

Running Third-Party Programs as Post-Processing Step

You can specify to run a third-party program after processing each file, or after processing all files, providing output file path(s) as the argument. This is useful if you want to do additional processing on the files that at present cannot be achieved with this program.

Other Options

You can specify additional things that include: backup policy, whether original files should be deleted, should processing stop on errors, etc.

Processed Files Naming Options

When it comes to saving processed files, the program really shines, as it comes with built-in professional file renamer tool that lets you easily design file naming pattern simply by drag-dropping different name parts (tags) onto the text area. And there are many tags to choose from: various hashes and checksums like MD5, SHA, SHA2, CRC16, CRC32, etc; file size; parts of original name/folder; creation and modification dates and their parts; random characters; EXIF and ID3 met tags; etc. You can even perform search and replace operations on the file name patterns you design!

Moreover the program can act solely as bulk file name renamer utility: you do not have to add any actions to the action sequence, and choose to only rename files instead!

Select Files for Processing with Deep File Search

In all of the processing modes, files for processing can be selected using recursive (deep) file search, where the program automatically scans specified directories for files matching desired criteria, such as: file name pattern, extension, size, dates, content etc. This has several advantages:

  • Program automatically searches for desired files - no need to pick files manually
  • Not just file name and attributes, but also their content in both text and binary form can be examined
  • Complex searches can be saved and reused later

For finding files with file names matching a specific pattern, you can either use extended wildcards with support for positive and negative matches, sub-masks, character ranges, grouping and alternation patterns; or use even more powerful Regular Expressions.

Advanced Wildcards

You can easily add files for processing matching a specific file name pattern and having certain extension(s) with advanced wildcards! Of course, you could use regular Operating System file search, but it is very weak and supports only basic wildcards. On the other hand, Regular Expressions may be too complicated for a trivial task like selecting files matching a give name pattern.

Advanced wildcards, one of Batch File Replace's many unique features, is what you would want to use!

Regular OS Wildcards Advanced Wildcards Regular Expressions
Files beginning with lowercase letters a through m and having jpg, bmp, or png extensions:
a*.jpg;a*.bmp;a*.png;b*.jpg;… <a-m>*.(jpg|bmp|png) [a-m].*\.(jpg|bmp|png)
Files beginning with file which is not followed by an underscore character _:
- file(!_)*.* file(?!_).*\..*
Files beginning with start and not containing skip between start and end:
- start*(!skip)*end*.* start(?(.*(skip))|.*)end.*\..*
Files not beginning with page, whose name part ends with a digit, and not having either bmp or jpg extensions:
- (!page)*#.*(!bmp|jpg) (?<!page).*\d\..*(?!(bmp|jpg))

Triggered / Scheduled Processing Jobs

It is possible to create scheduled or triggered processing jobs that will be automatically performed even if the program is not running. And there is no limit to how many such jobs can be created!

For every job you can specify the files to be processed, actions to be performed, output settings, and other processing options.

When the processing job is triggered, depending on the job's setting the program will be automatically launched in either GUI, console, or hidden mode, and the processing will be automatically started. When done, the program will exit automatically.

There are numerous triggers available: daily, weekly, monthly, event-based, etc.

Common Tasks

The program gives you full control when designing the sequence of actions; yet at the same time if you are just starting or want to perform some basic task quickly, the program offers numerous common tasks organized into categories that you can simply click on and see the needed actions be automatically added to the action sequence for you, so you can get started in no time!

Note that with the built-in actions and operations you can do much more than what you can do with common tasks described above! Common tasks by no means represent all of product's functionality, but rather facilitate product's use when it comes to dealing with frequently occurring tasks.

Full Command Line Support & Console Operation

Batch File Replace has full support for command line operation. It can not only be started from command line with specific options, but it can also run and operate entirely in console window.

A typical usage scenario would be to first specify a sequence of actions to be performed and then save that sequence to a template file. Then you can easily process files entirely from command line using a few switches: input directory and input file pattern, path to a saved action sequence template file, and output directory with file naming pattern.

Some benefits of command-line processing include:

  • Ability to launch program and perform file processing on demand or by invoking it from third-party tools
  • Perform processing a bit more efficiently without consuming a few extra resources needed to display and update Graphical User Interface
  • Manually schedule the program to run with specific parameters using third-party scheduling programs or other automation software
  • Execute batch processing tasks directly from Windows Power Shell
  • Execution from a batch file with different parameters each time
  • Simultaneous execution of several instances
  • Faster startup and configuration as predefined command line snippets can be used, and in general typing is faster than manipulating UI elements

Highly Customizable with Options

The program can be easily customized to your preferences, thanks to the many options that it has. Various options include:

  • Auto-load and auto-save options that control which items the program will automatically save upon exit
  • Syntax highlighting, colorization, and interactive tooltips in textual fields
  • Tooltips preferences that control how and when the tooltips will be displayed
  • Font options that let you choose the default type and size of the monospace font the program uses in text fields
  • Various other User Interface related settings including theme kind, color-coding, etc.
  • Different processing options like the number of threads, queue size, maximum text file size for Regular Expressions, etc.

Integrated Help with Informative Tooltips

With Batch File Replace we have re-imagined the concept of in-place help for a software product with the goal for it to be readily-accessible, well integrated, useful, and detailed. No more clumsy external huge help files that would take hours to make sense of and relate to the program!

Instead, virtually all elements of the User Interface have very detailed, in some cases multi-paged, informative tooltips that not only explain what a particular button, checkbox, or option does, but also provide valuable insights and helpful tips letting you know how to take advantage of a particular feature.

Multi-paged tooltips can be easily viewed simply by scrolling with your mouse wheel. Certain contextual tooltips can also be moved around and pinned to stay on top of other windows. This may be invaluable if you need to keep certain information in the view while working on something else.

Optional Integration with Windows Explorer

Upon installation of the software, you have the option to install a Windows Shell extension that integrates a Batch Process context menu into Windows Explorer, making it super easy to simply right-click on a group of files or a folder and launch the program with the selected files and chosen operation already setup, so you can process the files right-away - directly from Windows!

Advanced Logging

When processing thousands of files using complex action sequences with multiple conditions and actions, certain things might go wrong occasionally; and that's where program's excellent troubleshooting abilities come in very handy.

Program's advanced logging capabilities make it super easy to diagnose problems and get rid of any processing warnings or errors. A very detailed log is automatically generated by the program for every processed file that contains details about which actions have been performed, when, with what options, and with what results. All this information is made available to you in a nicely formatted view once the processing has been completed.

The processing log can be manually saved to a file after processing and / or automatically generated as a text log file in the destination folder(s).

File Operations Helpers

File Operation Helpers make it easy to perform certain file-related tasks that do not directly correspond to the built-in actions. File Operation Helpers automatically setup the proper output settings depending on the operation you choose to perform.

File Operation Helpers are available for the following operations:

  • Copy and Move files
  • Rename files
  • Delete files
  • Set or Change file attributes
  • Split files
  • Join / Merge files
  • Generate hashes of files' contents
  • Encrypt / decrypt files

Note different file operation helpers are available depending on the product you are using.

Alternative User Interface Theme

Program also offers alternative User Interface skin for cases when Aero rendering is not available, or if you prefer glass-less look instead.

Alternative UI Theme

If you do not like the default glass-like Aero theme with translucency effects, or if your Operating System does not support it, this alternative theme is available and can be easily made the default.

Other Features

Some other notable features that are not represented in the screenshots above:

  • Virtually all actions allow you to customize the range of their operation, so that you can restrict a particular action to operate only on a specified part of the file (as if the file itself was smaller).
  • Built-in base-converter tool that lets you convert numbers and byte sequences between binary, decimal, and hexadecimal forms.
  • Multi-colored smart rendering of file paths in file lists that highlights most important parts of the file path, so that you can see file name, its parent directory as well as the drive - all at a glance.
  • Program automatically remembers the values you enter into drop-down lists so that next time you need them, they can be selected from a drop-down! It also remembers the file paths you specify for files and folders, so that if you ever reopen the same Select Folder or Choose Files dialog again, it will automatically be opened where you left it last time.

Customization & Extensibility

Although by itself Batch File Replace is a professional product, it cannot possibly offer every feature you may want, or be used in all possible scenarios. This is not a problem however, because this product was built with extensibility in mind from the ground up.

The functionality offered by Batch File Replace can be extended in the following ways:

  • Software Development Kit (SDK) will let you develop your own actions and conditions that can be directly used by the product just as built-in ones. All that is required is basic knowledge of either C#, F#, or VB.NET and Microsoft .NET Framework 3.5 / .NET Core 3.1 or higher.
  • Actions Library will let you use all the various processing actions together with their UI in your own projects. Library is provided as a COM-Compatible .NET DLL that you can use in your own projects to leverage the functionality offered by the various processing actions.
  • Custom Development - should you need it, we can customize the product for you so it specifically meets your needs. Batch File Replace provides a solid foundation for batch file processing upon which our experienced developers can quickly create a customized, professional solution that meets your needs.

Software Development Kit (SDK)

Note the SDK is available and can be used only with Batch File Replace's mother product - Batch Files, which is a superset of Batch File Replace's features. If you plan to extend product functionality with SDK, you must obtain Complete Edition of Batch Files.

You can easily extend functionality offered by Batch File Replace' built-in actions by designing your own using this SDK as a guide. Batch File Replace provides all the basic actions that perform general tasks, such as resize, crop, watermark, etc.; however you may have a need to process images in a specific way, and hence require custom actions.

With this SDK and basic VB.NET or C# programming skills you will be able to create your own custom actions that you can then use from within the program to effectively accomplish your goals. We recommend you use Microsoft's free Visual Studio Community to develop your extensions using this SDK, but of course if you have Visual Studio, SharpDevelop IDE, or any other IDE capable of producing .NET 3.5 libraries, you can use it as well.

Actions Library

Actions Library is provided as a COM-Compatible .NET DLL that you can use in your own projects to leverage the functionality offered by the product's various processing actions. Whereas with SDK you extend the product with the actions you create, with Actions Library you extend your own solution by utilizing the functionality of the product.

For example, if you want to use file processing capabilities offered by Batch File Replace, with the Actions Library you will be able to do just that.

Actions Library needs to be acquired separately from the main product. So, please contact us to get Actions Library. We will also be happy to answer any questions you may have regarding licensing, pricing, integration, and other issues.

Let Us Customize Batch File Replace for You!

If Batch File Replace is not exactly what you are looking for, we can customize it for you so it specifically meets your needs! It can be done at a low cost to you, as Batch File Replace provides a solid foundation upon which new features can be effectively added by our experienced developers to quickly create a customized, professional solution that meet your needs!

Keep in mind that contracting us to customize the product will be much cheaper and faster than hiring a programmer or doing the work with your own resources, as we have extensive experience in the area of custom development, and what's more - Batch File Replace is a solid foundation upon which all the extra functionality that you desire can be built. More than 10 000 man-hours and over 100 000 lines of code went into the creation of Batch File Replace, so recreating even part of its functionality from scratch would require lots of resources.

Do you need customization?

  • The product does not exactly meet your needs?
  • Some feature you would like to use is not in the product?
  • Would you like to add another action or operation?
  • Need more options and customizations?
  • Want to integrate the product with your existing business logic?

Custom Development Benefits

  • No programming skills are required - we do everything for you!
  • Low-cost professional development by experienced team
  • Fast development because it leverages existing product and infrastructure
  • Professional User Interface and familiarity as new features are integrated into existing product
  • Royalty-free, flexible licensing model
Request Custom Development Now

Look no further! Contact us to request a quote and start custom development!