Here’s another trick: DigDB, an awesome Excel plug-in.

Basically, you download it, load it into Excel and use it to run a special mix and match sort of macro. In my case, for example, I needed to name 800 files with a certain naming pattern.

So, for example, EEE1000-1-1-1.jpg. Each “1” had a list of variations. So I put together a list in Excel. Something like this.

Of course, it was much longer, but that gives you an idea. I would append “EEE1000-” as text, then add in each column separately, divided by “-” text and finally topped off with “.jpg.” This way I could generate 800 file names quickly. How did I take all those file names and easily rename 800 files using data from Excel? Well, that’s another entry.