Folder Expansion and Filtering

slouw · November 26, 2024, 12:11am

Opi!
I make alot of use of the very nice Folder Expansion Feature
Prefs > File Displays > Folder Expansion

Consider the lister below.
Let us define 2 terms:
Parent location =

C:......\Site Photos.
This is the folder location that the lister shows.

Child location

C:......\Site Photos\2024-10-14 ODS Boom Gate
This is the expanded folder

In the top screenshot the Child Location has been expanded and it's contents as displayed.
The 2nd screenshot shows the same lister and expanded folder (Child Location) but with a filter applied to the Parent Location.
As you can see the filter applies to the Parent Location AND the Child Location.
Is it possible to change this so that the filter applies to the parent only?
I cannot find an option to do this..... but Opus has surprised me before!
If not perhaps it might be applied to the very long feature wish list!

lxp · November 26, 2024, 6:39am

You can already edit the filter to only apply to the parent.

slouw · November 27, 2024, 12:00am

@Ixp thank you.
I feel like this is a silly question - how does one do that?
I have looked at the Filter Bar in some detail see below.
I have also looked through
Prefs >> Filtering and Sorting
But cannot find anything.

What am I missing?

lxp · November 27, 2024, 7:26am

The filter will always be applied to all items in the file display, so you need to modify the filter itself.

Here is an example that uses the Evaluator:

InStr(fullpath, "Boom") >= 0

slouw · November 29, 2024, 1:41am

Hi @IXP
Thanks again for your kind help.
Your suggested filter does not seem to do the trick unfortunately.
See below.
The feedback you give is still very useful because I now know the limits|charater of the filter feature.

I have to work out a filter with the following logic:
("boom" is contained in the Parent) AND ("boom" is NOT contained in the Child)

I am most comfortable with Regular Expressions so I have played with them a but but to no avail.
One problem is that the literal backslash (Represented confusingly with a backslash as an escape charater in Regex i.e. "\\")
Is not available to be consumed by the regex filter.
So this works as expected:

.*boom.*

But this does not:

.*boom.*\\

I will update here if I find way

lxp · November 29, 2024, 6:57am

The classic quick filter (with or without regex) works against the file name. Use the Evaluator mode to reference the file path.

slouw · November 30, 2024, 7:45am

I cannot for the life of me see how this might be done.
I have scoured the Evaluator Reference but nothing I can see.
Not sure how a scripted approach would work either.
I know I could use scripting to invoke internal commands in this case set QUICKFILTER variants.
But I could just do that directly and I am back to square one.

Let us fantascise that we have a script method.
Call it.
onGetFilterStatus
I know,,,, I know.
And let us imagine further that, like OnGetNewName, it is invoked individually for each file/folder selected.
And if some flag is set, then that file/folder is filtered.
Effectively a hide file/folder property for every individual file/folder in play.
Then I could imagine that, with alot of work, one might script solution.
Have I found that rare situation where Opus can actually not do something?
Or am I just not understanding my tools......?
Well if that does not tempt you then nothing will!!!!!!!
Haaaa!

lxp · November 30, 2024, 8:27am

Try

(IsDir(fullpath) && Match(name, "*Boom*")) || (IsFile(fullpath) && !Match(name, "*Boom*"))

Here's a button for easier testing. Note how the quotes got escaped.

XML

<?xml version="1.0"?>
<button backcol="none" display="both" hotkey_label="yes" label_pos="right" textcol="none">
	<label>QF53627</label>
	<icon1>#filterfolder</icon1>
	<function type="normal">
		<instruction>Set QUICKFILTERFLAGS=evalon,regexpoff,flatviewoff,ignorediacriticsoff,anywordoff,partialoff QUICKFILTER=&quot;(IsDir(fullpath) &amp;&amp; Match(name, &quot;&quot;*Boom*&quot;&quot;)) || (IsFile(fullpath) &amp;&amp; !Match(name, &quot;&quot;*Boom*&quot;&quot;))&quot;</instruction>
	</function>
</button>

PassThePeas · November 30, 2024, 8:33am

It seems to work for me :

A button with the following code works for me (or I didn't understand what you're looking for .... still an option )

Set QUICKFILTER="InStr(fullpath, ""Boom"") >= 0"

BuckyB · November 30, 2024, 3:24pm

I can't get this to work in a script. Both lxp's and PassThePeas' commands work when entered directly, but not in a FAYT script.

Using the code below on folder Test\, containing files Test.txt and Nope.txt,
quickfiltering Te will filter out Nope.txt when the folder is expanded.

// FAYT Quickfilter folders

var qff  = 'Set QUICKFILTERFLAGS=evalon QUICKFILTER="InStr(fullpath, ""_ReplaceMe_"") >= 0"';
var qffr = '_ReplaceMe_';

function OnInit(initData)
{
	initData.name           = "FAIT2 Quickfilter folders";
	initData.default_enable = true
}

function OnAddCommands(addCmdData)
{
	var cmd = addCmdData.AddCommand();
	cmd.name       = "FAIT2QuickfilterFolders";
	cmd.method     = "OnFAIT2QuickfilterFolders";
	//cmd.template   = "";

	var fayt       = cmd.fayt;
	fayt.enable    = true;
	fayt.key       = ".";
	fayt.label     = "FAIT2QuickfilterFolders";
	fayt.realtime  = true
}

function OnFAIT2QuickfilterFolders(scriptFAYTData)
{
 	var query = scriptFAYTData.cmdline;
	var cmd = DOpus.Create.Command();
	cmd.SetSourceTab(scriptFAYTData.tab);
	cmd.RunCommand(qff.replace(qffr, query));
}

errante · November 30, 2024, 3:58pm

My guess is that this happens because you're creating a new Command object each time you type something, which doesn't have any items added to it.

At least in a quick test, this ready-to-use FAYT script will handle that and more (Although I've tested it with a much more advanced version than the one currently published)

slouw · November 30, 2024, 9:29pm

OMGoodness thanks guys!
Just walked in to work and see the above.
I have to err do some work but cant wait to get into this !!!

slouw · December 1, 2024, 4:25am

Thanks @PassThePeas
NOTE - This Post was edited

I have upgraded to latest stable
Directory Opus 13.11 Build 9081 x64 OS 10.0 (B:19045 P:2 T:1) SP 0.0
I found that enabling this seemed to help (Although i think this should just change the default?):

Now the top folder only works.
Note folders 2 and 3 (non empty) still have the same problem:

slouw · December 1, 2024, 5:24am

Removing the extra check boxes make no difference

Partial matching
Use Regular Expression

BuckyB · May 25, 2025, 7:23pm

Let me necro this thread to make an official feature request for this.

I can not get this to work 100%, and I really dislike how the code is cluttering up the box where the filter is shown. I would prefer the box to just show whatever was used to filter.

Can we get a built-in FAYT filter or an added checkbox to select all/folders/files?

slouw · February 13, 2026, 7:41am

Greetings Opi

I see alot of development in the Evaluator space
Might there be any new feature to make this work?

errante · February 13, 2026, 11:23pm

If I understand correctly, then you do want to search by fullpath?
That way, if a folder passes the filter, its children would also pass most of the time (it is not that the filter is not applied to them, but they share the same full path as their parent).

slouw · February 14, 2026, 11:38pm

@errante

Context

Root folder that contains files (call them parent files) and folders (parent folders)
The parent folders themselves contain files (call them children files)

Want I want

To filer on the Root folder to have the following affect

Filter acts on the parent files and parent folders only
When a parent folder is * expanded the children files should NOT be filtered

What is happening now

I think DO is executing a full path filter now.
Which is why the children files are being filtered as well as the parent files.
This is what I do not want

Filter on Parent Level only

In this scenario the parent files and parent folders are still filtered.
But the children files are not.

Hope this explains things better?

errante · February 15, 2026, 12:06am

It's basically the same thing you mentioned in the first post .
To avoid making the conversation unnecessarily longer, you can try with this script. Once installed, you can use (in a button or wherever you prefer) something like:

PeakFilter DIALOG=fullpath

And use that dialog for filtering.

Or you can also go to Script Management and configure the script (just run Prefs SCRIPTS=PeakFilter.osp/PeakFilter.js) like this:
default implicit column : user defined
user defined implicit column : fullpath

Then invoke the FAYT script (by default with $) and just start typing to filter things. You can also use search flags (there is a cog icon next to the FAYT field).

Most of the time it will work the way you want (it will depend on the flags you use and whether the pattern you use intentionally excludes text that is part of the child names but not from its parents).