Greetings,
I was about to buy Hazel, but I came across Keyboard Maestro, so I’m doubt which one to buy.
I see Keyboard Maestro goes far beyond Hazel, worth considering, but can I do these on KM?
When an invoice is saved into a folder, the App reduce the weight of the file, searches inside the PDF for a date and a name, renames the PDF using the date and name found inside the PDF, then moves the file into another folder
Can I do things like this on KM? (I need many tasks like this one: managing files and folders)
More important: how easy is setting up this kind of task on KM over Hazel?
Hi @IvanPsy, welcome to the Keyboard Maestro forum!
With regards to the OCR (only necessary if invoices are scanned) and PDF thinning, neither application provides these features natively. But the other requirements you mention are in the wheelhouse of Hazel, thus it’s a great fit.
I’m sure you could do the same with Keyboard Maestro but it would take more time to develop and might require the incorporation of one or more third-party tools available via Homebrew, or otherwise.
Keyboard Maestro is an amazing and powerful tool providing endless opportunities for macOS automation. Hazel is great too, but much more specialized.
If macOS automation, in general, sounds appealing to you, and you are willing to spend some time to learn Keyboard Maestro, I suggest you download the trial (+ read: Getting Started [Keyboard Maestro Wiki]) and/or watch this video: Getting Started with Keyboard Maestro. It's an investment, but one that many, including me, find to pay big dividends.
When specific questions arise, this forum is a great resource.
Thank you @_jims for your reply.
I think I'll go for Hazel for folders and file management: I need something fast and friendly.
But I've put KM in the wishlist, so that I'll buy it after Hazel: there are many other automations I'll be happy to delegate to KM
Hazel and keyboard maestro are both great programs, I think many of us here use both or have used both at one time or another. I think the consensus is typically that keyboard maestro can duplicate or substitute for the features of many of the alternative software‘s that are brought up here, but sometimes it is easier to use the specialized tool.
