Still color-coding media folders by hand for Avid?
Symly turns the one folder path Avid reads from, Avid MediaFiles/MXF, into a tunnel via a POSIX symlink that repoints the media Avid reads from without ever copying, moving, or deleting media files.
Drive
Active media folder
How it works
Three steps. No media moved.
Download the Symly app
Free and open source. Drag it to your Applications folder and open it.
Pick your drive
Choose the external drive your Avid media lives on, and either create a new media folder, or pick an existing one.*
Switch in one click
Symly creates the tunnel via the POSIX symlink from Avid MediaFiles/MXF to your selected media folder.
* If there are media files already existing in the Avid MediaFiles/MXF path, Symly will ask your permission to move that media to the Symly Media folder. Alternatively, you can move the media files manually out of the Avid MediaFiles/MXF path prior to setting up Symly.
Where it came from
I lived this problem.
I came up as an assistant editor at shops like Cut+Run and Final Cut, living the dance every Avid editor knows all too well.
Avid only reads media from one file path, Avid MediaFiles/MXF. So it becomes the process you get too used to: rename a media folder to Avid MediaFiles so Avid sees it, rename it back when you switch projects, and color-code everything inside so nothing gets lost. The renaming and color-coding is annoying. The real cost is the mess: media spread across folders, disorganized.
I found a fix while working as a systems engineer at Final Cut. The first version was an Automator app called Project Picker. It went out to 15+ editors around the world, and it held up. Symly is that idea, rebuilt as a real, open app.
Project Picker, the original Automator app, was built with Ryan Johnson.
Free and open
A tool that touches your media should hide nothing.
Symly is free and open source. The whole promise is that it never copies or deletes your media, and the strongest version of that promise is letting you read exactly what it does.
github.com/brandoniben/symly
Apache License 2.0
- Every line of the engine, public.
- Never copies or deletes your media.
- Yours to read, fork, and audit.
Download Symly.
Free and open source, for Avid on macOS.
System requirements
- macOS
- 13 Ventura or laterUniversal: Apple Silicon and Intel.
- Media Composer
- Any modern versionAnything that reads from the Avid MediaFiles/MXF path.
- Drive format
- APFS or Mac OS ExtendedNot exFAT or FAT32: they can't store the link.
- Disk space
- NoneSymly only creates links, never a copy of your media.
Built for the external drive your Avid media lives on. Not intended for use with NEXIS, NAS, SAN, or cloud storage.