How Should I Name My Files?
One of the most neglected areas in any production environment (not only in publishing) concerns file-naming conventions. It is also one of the easiest to remedy.
Let’s talk about why file names are important:
- How you name your files can make them much easier to find.
- In any collaborative environment, where multiple people are reviewing and making changes to files, how those files are named can make the difference between using the correct or incorrect (i.e., outdated) version.
Over many years I’ve seen countless instances where avoidable errors were made simply because someone in the pipeline used the wrong file.
Let’s put this in some perspective:
Imagine if skyscrapers, which can have hundreds or even thousands of offices, didn’t have numbers assigned to floors or rooms. Finding a particular room would be difficult, if not impossible.
Now image a hard drive with thousands of files (in this case, images). And let’s say you wanted to find a specific image. Unless you took the very fast and simple step of naming those files in a logical, consistent way when you initially saved them, it will be a “needle-in-a-haystack situation”: Depending on the number of images, you could spend hours searching.
1: The date, in a YYYY_MMDD format. 2: What it is. 3: First and last initials of who saved it (collaborative environments) 4: Version number (if applicable).
There are two parts to the method I’ve followed for many years.
The W3+V Scheme: When_what_who_version
Simply stated, this stands for when a file was created or saved, what it is, who saved it (for collaborative environments), and which version it is. In collaborative environments there should be four parts, separated by underscores:
So in a case of a manuscript by Jones that I reviewed it would be this:
2025_1017_Jones manuscript_DG_v1 reviewed
The date format is especially critical because it allows for very simple and accurate sorting of electronic files by name: if one were to use MMDDYYYY (which many people do), in a folder full of files from multiple years, you’d get all of the files from any January first, followed by those from any November and December, then those from February (because they’d be sorted based on 1, 11 12, 2.
Of course you could sort by date modified, but that could potentially makes things confusing in other ways. The YYYY_MMDD method is a far safer method.
YTIYNI: You touch it, you name it:
The second part of the method I use is also simple: If you make changes to a file in a collaborative environment, add your initials. This is particularly critical when a stakeholder sends the same file to multiple people at the same time and they’re expected to return them individually. Even if posting in the cloud, adding your initials can ensure that there’s no confusion in the recipient’s end.
For authors these methods can be useful for keeping their own work organized. I worked with an author several years ago who had been toiling away at his book for 10 years. When he was finally finished he couldn’t really figure out which files for the many chapters were the ones he intended to use. He had multiple Word docs with names like “new manuscript,” “revised manuscript,” and “final manuscript.” I discovered very late in the game that his most recent changes had not been made to the most recent versions.
And a word about “final.” I strongly discourage ever labeling a file final because it’s only “final” till the next time you decide to make a change. It’s a much better approach to rely on the date in the file name: That tells you which is the most recent version.
And lastly, while I don’t normally endorse software to any great extent, in any Windows environment I strongly recommend a safe, free, lightweight, and reliable program called Everything!, which is a search tool that’s far simpler, more intuitive, and more reliable than anything Microsoft has ever produced. It can be downloaded here:
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