How do you find files with the same name?

[David]

I might be missing the obvious but would someone please tell me how to search for files with exactly the same name.

For this particular search I  wish to disregard content, size, tags or any other parameter. I just want to see all files with exactly the same name.

[hsei]

I'm not sure whether that makes sense. There are dozens of other tools doing exactly that.
It is almost contrary to the primary aim of similarity. I would rate that as a peripheral option with low priority.

[David]

So I gather from your reply that Similarity cannot find files with the same name.
That is OK.

Similarity has been the best tool by far that I have found for finding duplicates.
I now have a large group of files in may different folders.
The duplicates have been removed.

I am trying to organize a large and diverse collection with titles from the 1940s up to today.
I find that many tracks have the same name but are slightly different versions or releases of the same song.

My passion when I play a track for my personal enjoyment is to hear the original version that I remember from my earlier days.

The problem with deleting the files with the same name is that I often end up deleting the original version and am left with a later re-recording.

So, I would like to identify files with the same name and move them all to the same folder to have a closer look and listen.

You mention that there are dozens of other tools out there that do what I want.
Perhaps I have looked at the wrong ones, so can you tell me the name of one that might help me.

The perfect application would:
Find files with the same or similar name.
Display the Name, Size, Date etc. plus at least the track length and tags.
Allow me to listen, delete or move
Allow me to move all files to one folder for further processing

I know that one workaround is to copy and paste from one folder to another without copying over an existing file.
This is tedious and not practical when one has many folders.

So if there is any member out there with my particular issues I would love to hear how you have dealt with the situation. What tools have you used to do the job?

[hsei]

OK, I understand that your request is not just looking for same name files. I suppose you want to keep a more original version even if it doesn't have the same name.
If there were an option to move all files in a duplicate group into a directory by some user input or even by an automatic \\root\artist scheme, it would do what you want and even more. That would make sense for me in the similarity context. By adjusting the %-threshold you can fine tune what you get in a duplicate group. You can play with that after having performed an extensive search (raising the threshold), you don't need to restart the search.
This group member moving/copying is an idea I would strongly support.

If you are only interested in working on identically named files, a simple explorer search would do. In Windows 7 a following mark and copy/move even renames them to <file> (1), <file> (2) etc. Other explorer clones may do that even in earlier windows versions.

[David]

I mostly agree with your points.

I think you would agree that using explorer is not really a viable solution when dealing with a large number of files.

I certainly agree that the group member moving/copying idea might be a worthwhile function for the developers to consider adding to the product.

I do however think that there is a problem trying to use the existing sliders to locate different versions of an audio file.
The sliders combine to identify tracks that are the same. They can be tweaked to do this with extreme accuracy regardless of the file name.
That is the strength of the tool in its current form.
I believe your original statement that my issue is counter to the primary aim of Similarity, is very true of the program in it's current form.

I have a possible solution to propose.
The addition of another slider. The “file name” slider.
It could use a fuzzy logic type of name matching algorithm.
It could allow the user to select anywhere between a 100% exact match all the way to a complete 0 % match on file name.
It could be used alone or in combination with the other sliders to define many different types of search.

The first time I used Similarity I could not understand why this slider was missing.


Anyway, this is not likely to appear in the program overnight and I still have my problem.
If anyone knows of a good utility to do what I am trying to do, then please let me know what it is.

[hsei]

I still consider file name similarity not to be in the primary scope of similarity.
But there might be a workaround for you:
If you are willing to build artist & song name tags with rules from filename (tools like MP3tag can do that using sophisticated rules with a mass processing ability), you can use the tag similarity slider for building duplicate groups. Tag similarity is done on a fuzzy approach. This could work as a substitute for a file name slider, as long as you haven't found a fuzzy file name comparison tool or it is not implemented in similarity.

[David]

I strongly dis-agree I see no reason why the idea of finding similar files is not in the scope of a program named similarity.

MP3 tag studio is a fantastic product that I have supported for years however I did not want to have to modify tags at this point because of the large number of folders I would have to manually work through. I am trying to find software to save me effort.

So thank you for taking the time to discuss the issue.

I would still be grateful to hear from someone else who may have some ideas about how I might achieve my desired outcome.

[David]

Just in case anyone is reading this thread at a later date, I found a program that looks very promising for locating, moving or deleting the remaining duplicates after you finish processing with Similarity.

The program is DuplicateCleaner 2.0.4 from DigitalVolcano
and the dowload link I used is http://www.digitalvolcano.co.uk/content/duplicate-cleaner/downloaddcmenu

Cheers

[Craig Mollekin]

Thanks, David.  That looks like just what I need.