Command snippets when working with metadata in OSX. More info: https://gfxhacks.com/renaming-files-by-date-from-metadata

fileMetadataOSXCommands.sh

# Based on this example date: 2020-12-31 16:01:33 +0000


# ---- Reading Metadata ---- #

# read all file's metadata attributes
mdls file.ext

# get file's metadata attribute by name
mdls -name kMDItemContentCreationDate file.ext
# returns: kMDItemContentCreationDate = 2020-12-31 16:01:33 +0000

# get multiple file's metadata attributes by name
mdls -name kMDItemContentCreationDate -name kMDItemContentModificationDate file.ext
# returns: kMDItemContentCreationDate = 2020-12-31 16:01:33 +0000
#          kMDItemContentModificationDate = 2020-12-31 18:21:48 +0000	


# ---- Formatting mdls datetime output ---- #

mdls -name kMDItemContentCreationDate filename.ext | sed 's/[^0-9]//g' | cut -c 3-14
# returns: 201231160133 (YYMMDDhhmmss)

mdls -name kMDItemContentCreationDate filename.ext | cut -d " " -f 3 
# returns: 2020-12-31 (YYYY-MM-DD)

mdls -name kMDItemContentCreationDate filename.ext | sed 's/-/_/g' | cut -d " " -f 3 
# returns: 2020_12_31 (YYYY_MM_DD)