Here’s an experimental script I’ve been working on to yank the most recently modified files to the currently viewed group. The script can be easily modified to allow for replication instead of moving, but I prefer moving.
I’d like to see the script support to work on the most recently added files instead of the most recently modified files, but Devonthink’s scripting search command does not have the ability to search on “addition date.” I’m hoping that that may someday be possible. I know christian has plenty of work for version 2 final. But maybe thereafter? 
But for now, this seems to work well for me if you assign it a keystroke. It ignores docs in the trash or those already in the current group, so you can repeatedly invoke it to yank more and more files to the present.
I’m sure this one has bugs in it. Please report them and I’ll update the script. Hopefully it is useful to someone !
best,
Erico
---Recent File Yank to current Group
---Grab most recently modified record from all open devonthink databases and insert in current viewer window.
---Helpful for when Devonthink inserts a captured pdf or text where you didn't expect it to!
---This version will not move records from the trash, and it will not move records having a parent in the current group. The latter is a feature nice because you can keep issuing the command to pull all the last items to the current group: it should successively move backwards through each "older" item, until it hits the hour threshhold in specified below.
--- the script could be modified to replicate instead of move, if so desired.
---Future Feature Request: It would be nice if Devonthink allowed one to *search* on addition date rather than just *modification date*. Ideally, one would have a script that could detected recently added (as well as merely recently modified) documents. Currently, if a file is dragged into the inbox and has an older modification date (in the filesystem), devonthink's applescripting command is not able to find this document, even if it was just added to the database. It would be a nice feature addition to support searches on "addition date"
--this script requires Mac Growl to be installed for notifications.
---By Eric Oberle, version .4a
property retrospection_threshhold : hours * 4
tell application "DEVONthink Pro"
----List of types to move (ignore all others)
set kinds_to_move to {"Image", "PDF", "PDF+Text", "Web Archive", "TEXT", "Bookmark", "RTF", "RTFD", "eml"}
set kinds_to_exclude to {"Group", "Smart Group", "Feed", "HTML"}
set text_was_selected to false
set all_databases to every database
----Try to figure out where to put the record
set the_Window to viewer window 1
set win_name to get name of the_Window
set viewer_window_record to content record of the_Window
set viewer_current_group to current group
set skip_record_if_it_has_one_of_these_parents to {viewer_current_group}
---if no record is selected, but we have a group use that.
if viewer_window_record is missing value then
set viewer_window_record to current group
end if
---see if we can identify parent of current record
try
set viewer_window_record_parent to parent 1 of viewer_window_record
on error
set viewer_window_record_parent to viewer_window_record
end try
set viewer_window_record_location to location of viewer_window_record
---log " viewer_window_record_parent " & ((name of viewer_window_record_parent) as string)
---do the search
set newest_record to my return_newest_record(retrospection_threshhold, all_databases, kinds_to_exclude, skip_record_if_it_has_one_of_these_parents)
---the following line uses explicit include
---set newest_record to my return_newest_record(retrospection_threshhold, all_databases, kinds_to_move, skip_record_if_it_has_one_of_these_parents)
if newest_record is {} then
display dialog "Sorry,but Devonthink found no records less than " & ((retrospection_threshhold / hours) as string) & " hours old. "
error number -128
return
end if
log "moving to " & name of viewer_current_group
set the_parent to parent 1 of newest_record
set record_name to name of newest_record
log "Moving " & record_name & "from... " & ((name of the_parent) as string)
my growlNotification("DEVONthink Pro", "Moving " & record_name, "from " & ((location of the_parent) & name of the_parent))
move record newest_record to viewer_current_group
end tell
on return_newest_record(max_age, the_databases, types_searched, groups_to_ignore)
set old_date to (current date) - (100 * days)
set newest_record to {}
using terms from application "DEVONthink Pro"
tell application "DEVONthink Pro"
repeat with the_database in the_databases
log "***** now searching ***" & (get name of the_database) as string
set db_root to root of the_database
set id_db_trash to id of trash group of the_database
---it would be *really nice* if devonthink's search command allowed one to search on addition date
set new_recs to search "" age max_age in db_root
repeat with the_record in new_recs
set exception_found to false
log "reviewing record " & (name of the_record as string)
set the_parents_id to id of every parent of the_record
set ids_to_ignore to {}
repeat with x in groups_to_ignore
set y to get id of x
set ids_to_ignore to ids_to_ignore & {y}
end repeat
set ids_to_ignore to ids_to_ignore & {id_db_trash}
---log "exception list "
---log (ids_to_ignore)
repeat with exception_id in ids_to_ignore ---groups_to_ignore
---set exception_id to ((get id of this_exception) as number)
repeat with this_parent_id in the_parents_id
---set this_parent to the first item of this_parent
log ("exception" & exception_id as string) & "vs. parent " & this_parent_id as string
if (this_parent_id as number) is equal to (exception_id as number) then
set exception_found to true
set parent_rec to get record with id exception_id in the_database
log "parent excluded: " & (name of parent_rec as string)
exit repeat
end if
end repeat
if exception_found then exit repeat
end repeat
---if ((get kind of the_record)) is in types_searched and exception_found is false then
if ((get kind of the_record) is not in types_searched) and (exception_found is false) then
log "kind match"
set the_name to get name of the_record
set new_date to get modification date of the_record
if (new_date > old_date) then
log "Found a newer one…" & name of the_record
set newest_record to the_record
set old_date to new_date
end if
end if
end repeat
end repeat
return newest_record
end tell
end using terms from
end return_newest_record
on growlNotification(growlIcon, growlTitle, growlDescrip)
if application "GrowlHelperApp" is running then
set appName to "ericsdtnotify"
set notifs to {growlTitle}
tell application "GrowlHelperApp"
register as application ¬
appName all notifications notifs ¬
default notifications notifs ¬
icon of application growlIcon
notify with name growlTitle title growlTitle description growlDescrip application name appName
end tell
end if
return ""
end growlNotification