Can I import Textexpander .csv files to Alfred 3 Snippets?

[owenb]

Hi, I have been using the subscription Textexpander, and while it's certainly much cheaper than it used to be at only $20 a year I'd still rather use less apps. The subscription version only seems to export snippets as CSV files not .textexpander files so the handy TE-to-Alfred3 script someone wrote doesn't work for me.

 

Is there a way to get dozens of TE snippets on a CSV file into Alfred 3 easily?

 

Thanks! 

[dfay]

https://github.com/derickfay/import-alfred-snippets

[vitor]

There’s also a website to do it directly.

[owenb]

7 hours ago, vitor said:

There’s also a website to do it directly.

 

Thanks but this is what I referred to in my original post, it only works with old .textexpander files, not the CSV files that the new Textexpander exports.

 

[owenb]

14 hours ago, dfay said:

https://github.com/derickfay/import-alfred-snippets

Thanks - but how does this work? It says it's a script... how do I run it? Not familiar with GitHub.

[deanishe]

1 hour ago, owenb said:

how do I run it?

 

Download this file and follow the instructions in the README on GitHub. They're pretty clear.

If you can't figure something out, post a detailed description of your issue and we'll help you.

[dfay]

I just updated the README with more detailed directions.

[deanishe]

30 minutes ago, dfay said:

just updated the README

 

Aha! I guess that was the version I read.

[owenb]

I truly appreciate the extra info in the readme, thanks! One problem, while I'm familiar with what the Terminal is, I don't know what this means:

 

"To run the script, open a Terminal window in the same directory where you put the script"

 

I'm using a Mac. Say I create a folder on my desktop called Snippets and that's where I'm going to dump everything. How do I "open a terminal window" that's directed to that folder? Thanks!

[deanishe]

Open the Terminal application, enter cd ~/Desktop/Snippets and hit ↩

 

(cd is "change directory")

[owenb]

2 minutes ago, deanishe said:

Open the Terminal application, enter cd ~/Desktop/Snippets and hit ↩

 

(cd is "change directory")

Perfect, thank you! Don't like to experiment with Terminal code myself, I know how powerful it is especially if I type something wrong!

 

[vitor]

2 hours ago, owenb said:

Thanks but this is what I referred to in my original post, it only works with old .textexpander files, not the CSV files that the new Textexpander exports.

 

Apologies. I was distracted and didn’t read properly.

[owenb]

Just now, vitor said:

 

Apologies. I was distracted and didn’t read properly.

 

No worries, thanks for helping out!

[deanishe]

20 minutes ago, owenb said:

I know how powerful it is especially if I type something wrong!

 

Powerful is good, though. Yes, you can really mess up a system by running the wrong command, but there are only a few things that are actually dangerous and you need to be careful with.

 

In any case, you can ultimately fix almost any damage from your backups. And if you don't have backups, you're already on course to have bigger problems that you could ever cause yourself with a shell.

[owenb]

1 minute ago, deanishe said:

 

Powerful is good, though. Yes, you can really mess up a system by running the wrong command, but there are only a few things that are actually dangerous and you need to be careful with.

 

In any case, you can ultimately fix almost any damage from your backups. And if you don't have backups, you're already on course to have bigger problems that you could ever cause yourself with a shell.

 

Oh don't worry I got backups up the wazoo!  Almost losing everything to an iBook drive failure taught me about that the hard way. Got 90% back via some awesome file recovery software I bought (forget the name now, but it was incredible, only $100 and got almost everything), and after that I invested in externals, daily overnight backups via SuperDuper, and Backblaze.  

[deanishe]

Oh yes. Had that experience myself. Not a whole lot of fun  

 

Not a fan of BackBlaze, though. Their restore procedure is to give you a single zip file with all your stuff in it. What the hell am I going to do with a 5TB zip file? I don't have a drive big enough to store that. Let alone two, so I can extract and decrypt it.

 

Far better to use something that puts the files straight back where they should be, imo.

[owenb]

12 minutes ago, deanishe said:

Oh yes. Had that experience myself. Not a whole lot of fun  

 

Not a fan of BackBlaze, though. Their restore procedure is to give you a single zip file with all your stuff in it. What the hell am I going to do with a 5TB zip file? I don't have a drive big enough to store that. Let alone two, so I can extract and decrypt it.

 

Far better to use something that puts the files straight back where they should be, imo.

 

Can you recommend a cloud service that offers that? My thinking is that if the situation is that bad that I need to use BB to get my entire system back, then I'll simply cough up for them to send it all on a drive, rather than download it all. Otherwise you can download individual files as far as I know, no? 

 

But mainly id use my local backup drive to restore from. Only reason I wouldn't be able to do that is if I'm unlucky enough to crash both the Mac and the backup at the same time, or there's a burglary or a fire/flood.

[deanishe]

22 minutes ago, owenb said:

Can you recommend a cloud service that offers that?

 

I've been using Arq for years with various cloud storage services.

 

29 minutes ago, owenb said:

Otherwise you can download individual files as far as I know, no? 

 

I think so. Which touches on the second thing I dislike about BackBlaze: they perform the decryption, so you have to grant them access to your data. I much prefer solutions that do all the encryption/decryption on the client side, so the storage service never sees any unencrypted data.

[owenb]

Hi folks, this all worked like a dream, I was sure I'd muck it up but nope! There was snippet in the csv that caused a problem, said it couldn't find the file or something, but I deleted that from the csv and ran it again and all worked. Added the problem snippet manually.

 

Quick Q - may have missed it but is there a copy of the default Textexpander snippets (accented words etc) for Alfred going around? I saw a Dropbox link in another thread but the link is 404d now.

[nikivi]

On 7/6/2018 at 2:46 PM, deanishe said:

I've been using Arq for years

 

I am curious where you store your backups at? If you don't mind sharing it. I've been thinking of using a cloud backup solution in combination with Time Machine and so far it seems Arq with BackBlaze as cloud provider is a good solution.

Edited July 13, 2018 by nikivi

[nikivi]

On 7/6/2018 at 2:46 PM, deanishe said:

they perform the decryption, so you have to grant them access to your data

I thought that Arq encrypts data and sends only encrypted data to BackBlaze. Only you have the key to decrypt it.

[deanishe]

1 minute ago, nikivi said:

I am curious where you store your backups at?

 

I used to use Amazon, but Google and MS give me a lot of space with my GSuite and Office subscriptions, so I currently have a copy on each of those.

[deanishe]

18 minutes ago, nikivi said:

I thought that Arq encrypts data and sends only encrypted data to BackBlaze. Only you have the key to decrypt it.

 

Arq has nothing to do with BackBlaze. You just described how Arq works. BackBlaze works as I described above.

[nikivi]

On 7/6/2018 at 2:46 PM, deanishe said:

second thing I dislike about BackBlaze

 

On 7/6/2018 at 2:46 PM, deanishe said:

prefer solutions that do all the encryption/decryption on the client side, so the storage service never sees any unencrypted data

 

I just was confused when you said this. I thought that you could encrypt backup on client side (i.e. with Arq) and then send encrypted backup to BackBlaze. So then what's not to like about BackBlaze, it's cheap too compared to the rest. From what I read BackBlaze doesn't need to decrypt the backup to store it.

 

That's what I was confused about. 

[vitor]

Bah! Bunch of weaklings, what you all are, with your fancy apps and your files in a cloud. What if it rains? Have you thought of that? True scotsmen don’t need backups, they memorise the binary representation of every file, and if they ever lose one they type it out. And that only if they’re in a hurry, because everyone knows the proper method is to forge the words on a metal plate inside a volcano, and read it back by holding it high to be struck by lighting.