Bulk rename Formstack Form PDFs based on the PDF data they contain.

When you export a zip file full of Formstack pdfs, which is submitted form data, they are all named something like: "Form_Submission_712305837.pdf", meaning, there is no indication of what the PDF contains.

Renaming each file by hand is too manual, so we will be using the python programming language and the PyPDF2 library to rename the files based on the content of each pdf, such as the Name of the Person who filled the form out and the Date the form was filled out.

Run cmd

$ cd C:\Python\python-venvs\batchrename

$ C:\Python\python-venvs\batchrename\Scripts\activate.bat

Export Formstack pdf zip file

Extract zip

Run the python script for the Form, in this case an Application form

$ python batchRenameApplication.py

$ deactivate

Download and install the python language for your operating system if you don't already have it installed.

Download Python | Python.org

On Windows -- run the setup file - Tick "Add Python to PATH"

Select "Custom" - Untick "tcl/thinker IDE" (we will be using VSCode)

Create a folder for Python on your PC (if not wanting to use the default Windows C:\Users\<User>\Apps folder) -- I chose to create C:\Python you might want to add the version of Python to the folder name, for example C:\Python3_9

Open a command prompt and navigate into the Python directory (on Windows):

Windows Key + S -- bring up the search field

cmd

Right-click "Command Prompt" -- Run as administrator

$ cd C:\Python (or whatever folder you setup)

Use the venv module (virtual env that comes with Python 3 by default)

Source: https://realpython.com/python-virtual-environments-a-primer/

$ mkdir python-venvs && cd python-venvs

Create a new virtual environment inside the directory:

$ python -m venv batchrename

$ cd batchrename

Activate the environment you created -- I used full path

$ C:\Python\python-venvs\batchrename\Scripts\activate.bat

We will use the PyPDF2 module for this project.

$ python -m pip install -U pip

$ pip install PyPDF2

First, we want to find out what Info we can get out of the Formstack pdfs, then we want to create a script that loops through a directory and renames each pdf with the info from inside the pdf.

Adapted script from source: https://stackoverflow.com/questions/50116318/how-extract-extract-specific-text-from-pdf-file-python

Create a renameBatchApplication.py python script file -- it will :

• look for pdf files in the directory you specified

• extract the "Given name or Names" and "Family Name" if those exist

• Append the FormSubmission Time and Date

• Rename the pdf file and loop to the next pdf file in the folder

Export a zip file containing each pdf separately -- you need to set this up in Settings - Advanced PDF -- turn on Exporting Multiple Submissions "One Submission Per PDF"

We only want to extract Data from the first page of the pdf --make sure you have multi-Page breaks unselected

1. In the Submissions section -- select all the pdfs you want to bulk export.

2. Then use the Export button to download a zip file containing the Submission pdfs.

3. Extract the zip file -- you can extract in the Downloads folder -- remember to reference the Downloards folder path in your batchRenameApplication.py script

Within the virtual environment, simply run:

Once you are finished, to "exit" your virtual environment, you deactivate it.

$ deactivate