Feature Request: Expand "Replace unsupported with" option

Advanced Renamer forum
#1 : 19/12-22 23:59
Jim
Posts: 2
Not sure if this software is even still under development or if the forums are monitored anymore, but I have a request for a modification of this setting.

The main reason I've switched to AR is for the TV renaming feature, since it's so much easier having it look up names from the online database. The main problem I have with this, though, is that show names often have unsupported characters in them, hence the need for the "Replace unsupported with" option. Unfortunately, only allowing one blanket replacement character for all unsupported characters is far from ideal, because then all of them become that one character and it can't be distinguished what it's supposed to be.

I use various characters in filenames to represent unsupported ones: ? -> _, * -> +, " -> '', etc. The only way I've been able to sort of use the correct characters is to make regex rules, some that are a bit complicated, to take a best guess at what the original character was based on the context. While I've managed to have it use the correct character most of the time, there will always be situations that it's wrong, and also just having to make so many extra, complex rules is a pain. It would be much easier and more accurate if the program allowed me to specify which characters to use to replace which unsupported ones, so when it's pulling the names from the database, it would for example automatically replaces a ? with a _ and an * with a +.
#2 : 20/12-22 01:59
David Lee
Posts: 1125
Just add a List Replace method.

#3 : 20/12-22 10:05
Jim
Posts: 2
Reply to #2:

That still has the same problem. The only "benefit" there is that it will be one rule instead of several, but it would still require the complex regex and it would still be best-guess vs actually matching characters. And not only would list replace be no better, it would actually be worse, because the order matters, and I need to be able to add new replacements in and shuffle things around as I experiment, something that can't be done with list replace, despite my pointing that out as an issue with it a couple years ago. It's for that reason I actually prefer to avoid using that feature.