Very simple: .tab files allowed for text import

[SamIWas]

I use Filemaker.  A lot.  For everything.  A few years ago, they changed something in their code which made it so you could not save exported data as a .txt file.  It has to be .tab.  Then you have to navigate to the file and change it manually to .txt.

 

Vectorworks does not allow the choice of .tab files at file selection during script imports.  I and others have tried for years to get Filemaker to fix the export file choice. But, being that they are owned by Apple now, admitting any kind of fault in the product and fixing anything based on customer request is unheard of.  

 

So, maybe Vectorworks (much more accepting of customer input) can make the change on their end?  Possible to allow the choice of .tab (tab-separated text) files?

[Gerard Jonker]

I'd like to support your wish.

 

Up to now I used https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/better-rename-10/id1063663640?mt=12

But I see there is a cheaper one, File Rename, that sets you back only 4.49 euro.

[Matt Panzer]

Mac OS also has a rename feature. Select the files, right-click on one, and choose the Rename Items command. You can then replace ".tab" with ".txt" for all of the files at once.

[SamIWas]

Yes...this is what I currently do.  I navigate to the folder in question and give the file a new extension each time (it's usually only one file at a time, but I do use Better Rename if it's a bunch).  That is cumbersome, especially when having to do it multiple times per day (or in the case of testing scripts, multiple times per hour).  Since Filemaker refuses to acknowledge such an issue, I am hoping that the more involved and helpful folks at VW can look into it!

[mjm]

In MacOS-land couldn't this become an automator action?

 

[SamIWas]

3 minutes ago, mjm said:

In MacOS-land couldn't this become an automator action?

 

 

This is an option, and what I will likely end up resorting to.  Just a pain to have to script around a simple file extension.

[Art V]

It should be a relatively simple solution to treat a .tab file as a .txt file, the .txt import code is already there.

Extension renaming solutions are a workaround but may mess things up a little if you also have to import into a spreadsheet or other program that automatically recognizes .tab files as tab delimited files instead of just a plain text file so it would be better to solve it at the program level anyway.

[Gerard Jonker]

@Matt Panzer Thank you! (old dog, new tricks...)

[Matt Panzer]

8 hours ago, Gerard Jonker said:

@Matt Panzer Thank you! (old dog, new tricks...)

 

You're welcome, Gerard.

PS: The problem with this old dog is not learning new tricks, it's remembering them a week later. ;-)