ELAN Converter™'s core functionality is to take a batch of input files and convert them into PDF. For this to happen, you have to let the application know the exact name of the input and output files. It would be boring and very time consuming to type in an output file name for every single input file, therefore the file naming is automatic in ELAN Converter™. All you need to do is specify what type of naming convention you would like to apply.

There are three main naming conventions that you can choose from. Your output files can be named the same way as your input files. Or you can use the subdirectory name as an output file name. Alternatively, you can use the first few characters in the input files to name your output file. In addition, it is possible to make further adjustments and customizations to the file naming, as we will show you later, but these are the three major modes that ELAN Converter™ offers. The naming mode that you select determines the fundamentals of your output file naming.

Note that the file naming you select also determines how your input images will be merged. You have the choice to create an individual output file for every input file, or to combine (merge) multiple input files into a single output. The way the merging is performed depends on the selected file naming convention.

In most cases ELAN Converter™ does a full directory replication while converting, which means the output folder will retain the directory hierarchy of your input folder. Let's say that you have a directory tree, as shown in Figure 1. Your output folder is going to maintain the same directory structure, except the files under the output directories will be PDF documents.

Figure 1. Directory replication

A: Input directory tree; B: replicated output tree

(Notes: In this example, we used common prefix type of merging.)

In Batch Mode, the file naming options are on the Batch Settings tab. In Watch Mode, these options belong to the watch folder properties. Double click on a folder at the Watch Selection List to see the options.

In the following sections, we are going to discuss the available options in detail. You can find the naming convention options in the Merging and Output File Naming group of the settings screen.