# Free Format

Free Format is a function that allows you to create your filenames from scratch by using `<tags>`. A tag is a special command that is replaced by unique information for each file when renaming. Click on the button to the left of the input field to view and add tags. In addition to tags you can also type any string you like in between the tags.

Further reading: How to use format tags

Problem: Your webcamera takes a picture every few minutes that is stored in a subfolder and named 0001.jpg, then 0002.jpg and so on. The subfolder itself is named after the current date. Each day the webcamera will create a new subfolder to store the images, and at the same time it will begin with 0001.jpg again, like this:
May09 0001.jpg 0002.jpg 0003.jpg ... | May10 0001.jpg 0002.jpg 0003.jpg ...
Now you want to have all image in one single folder. But since the filenames in each subfolder is the same, this is not possible! Solution: Use "Format Filename" to add the subfolders name to the filenames. The format string could be `<PARENT>_<FULLNAME>`. Now the files will have unique names and you can store them all in one folder: May09_0001.jpg May09_0002.jpg May09_0003.jpg May10_0001.jpg May10_0002.jpg May10_0003.jpg ...

Problem: All your Mp3 album folders contain playlists, but the playlists all have different names. You want all playlists to have the same name (Playlist). Solution: Change the file pattern from `*.*` to `*.m3u` (m3u is the file extension for playlists). Browser to your root mp3 folder and list all files, including subfolders. Now you will see only your playlist files. Using the Free Format function, simply type in `Playlist` and rename! (This works since there is only one playlist per folder. Had there been many, only the first one would get the new name since only one file can have the same name in a folder)