Folder Formats: Consistent Override OPTION

Help & Support
1

Greetings Developers, please implement this change asap.
The behavior at the bottom explains how folder formats work (in italics).

When viewing a folder where a format is applied and changes are made (like sorting), these local changes are persisted when changing folders which use the identical format.

This is fine for some users.

However there exists another kind of user that wants whatever the format definition is to override ANY local change and use the format as it's explicitly defined when changing folders EVERY TIME.

Ex. I'm in a lister and a format is applied, I then 'sort by name' (instead of date as is defined in the applied format), I move to another lister which uses the same format and the 'sort by name' is still applied (which I don't want). Some users only apply changes for the current dir, when we navigate away we want the format reset all the time as the format definition states, instead of having to manually do it after the fact.

Please implement an option to address this please. Preferably a global option.

The way it works now is somewhat flexilble but it waters down what formats are defined to accomplish 'Explicit respected settings'.
'Explicit respected settings' should be the default option.
'Flexible & semi-dynamic' option #2

I'm constantly wasting clicks/time resetting something I set up expecting it to function consistently as an 'Automatic Overrider' so in this sense 'folder formats' seems broken.

[i]Changes to the Default Formats

Say you are viewing a directory where a Default Format was applied because none of the Path Formats or Content Type formats matched. If you make a change to the window by adding or removing columns, setting a different view mode or changing the sort order, then your change will continue to be applied, within the current window only, when you go to other folders which pick up the same Default Format.

You can use the Folder Formats menu to explicitly reset the format. (Alternatively, just close the current window and open a new one, which is often quicker.)

Opus windows will only remember the changes you have made to one of the Default Formats. If you go to a folder showing a different Default Format and change it as well then your earlier changes will be forgotten.[/i]

2

Personally, I might very well use a 'temporary' view-mode change in some cases - but I certainly don't care one way or another which way is the 'default'. However - it's usually a bad idea to just go ahead and change default behavior on something many users are already used to. Either way, maybe there's a slightly different way than a single global option to change this behavior.

For instance - and qualifier keys already do something when you hold them and click on the column headers to change the sorting... Perhaps holding when clicking on a column could be used to perform a temporary view-mode change, instead of it being persistent.

And if people feel strongly enough about whether or not they needed to hold a qual key down for it to behave the way you're asking (vs making it the default for clicking on columns withOUT holding a qual key) then perhaps we'd do well to have total Prefs control over what the qual keys do. Perhaps an entry in Prefs like (maybe under Folders->Folder Display or someplace):

Column changes in Details/Power Mode:
== Drop-down box == Persistent on folder change
== Drop-down box == Temporary (reset on folder change)
== Drop-down box == Toggle Grouped view settings
== Drop-down box == Sort by multiple fields

...where I'd expect that holding would not just affect the sort field and direction being temporary for the current folder only, but also if you right clicked on a column header and turned on (or off) another column all-together. Then I'd expect holding to cause THAT kind of change to be temporary also.

That's just what I think you'd want from making a change within the UI itself... If you want the same ability from a RAW command optional argument, then perhaps a TEMP arg could be added. But really, I think that it's the UI where changes like that make more sense to be temporary or transient. But then, who knows how many people like to use buttons or hotkeys with RAW commands to make ~temporary changes to columns, fields, sort, etc... I certainly don't think there's ANY sense building in any sort of TEMP functionality into the actual Folder Options / Folder Formats systems at all...

3

Oh... and if the RAW commands for changing the view had a TEMP option - I think I might actually use that with Set FORMAT, and possibly Properties FORMATLIST myself... I'd probably modify some of the buttons I use so that I had @keydown clauses in there to emulate whatever clicking controls might be added to allow temporary changes in the UI. Again - if a change was made to allow ~something like clicking columns to be temporary - then I'd change my buttons to something like:

@keydown:none
properties formatlist
@keydown:shift
properties formatlist TEMP

...or something like that depending on what (if anything) were done towards this idea.

I'll be quiet now :slight_smile:...

4

You can create a folder format for your hard drive root (e.g. C:) and set it to apply to all sub-folders. If you do this then effectively every folder on the drive has a folder format and so any temporary changes to the format would be lost as soon as you changed folders. If you have multiple hard disks you'd need to create a format for the root of each one.

5

Well how about that... doesn't help for removable drives though without going in and defining a "default" format for all drive letters that might be assigned to a drive being connected.

6

You could probably do it all with a single wildcard format (e.g. ?:*) although I haven't tried.

7

Thanks for the workaround suggestions guys.

Those are certainly what I don't want.
I want to set up my foldr formats and forget about it. That's what they are designed for.

This should be a preference setting (not the default as you said, choice #2).

While they are at it, implement an 'auto-shrink,auto expand -scrollbar' boolean option in the columns tab of the folder formats dialog that can be applied to a specific column.

Better yet implement percentage values vs absoulute fixed pixel values to make the lister columns more dynamic.

8

You do only have to set it up once, especially if you go the wildcard route.

9

FWIW - I think you'll want to consider using *:* based on Jon's excellent suggestion... this way it will apply to paths OTHER than just single character "drive letter" based paths (such as library paths that start with lib://).

To Leo's point... this is a one time change and will result in the behavior you're asking for. So - while not an actual "checkbox" option, it gives you a single folder format to define that will affect all folders - and reset to your specified view every time you switch folders after making a change.

That said... I think my particular take on the general idea you've suggested is a good one for those (me :slight_smile:) who want the current default behavior "most" of the time... but who ALSO sometimes want a transient change to only affect the current folder. But it looks like Jon's suggestion is well suited for "you"...

10

Tried it, as a path format. It failed. *:*

The column sort was changed then all subsequent navigations inherited that column sort

11

Try * as the wildcard instead of *:* -- That seems to make it work for me.

12

You the bomb!, Thanks!

13

Snaps back EVERY Time as it should!

14

[quote="Zion"]Tried it, as a path format. It failed. *:*

The column sort was changed then all subsequent navigations inherited that column sort[/quote]
Hmmm... worked for me in a test. Glad you got it sorted though...

15

*:* wouldn't match lib:// since the slash is the wrong way around :slight_smile:

16

Well that would certainly make sense just from eye-balling it sure... but - try it... The ?:* does not work (as expected), but the *:* does indeed work for lib:// paths.

Maybe thats just a happy accident as Opus seems to generally not care between forward and back slashes in various places. Like say the Location field. Off topic for sure - but I've wished for a while that you'd use back slashes in that field. Every so often I copy that string out of there (I know I could so half a dozen ~other ways) for use somewhere else, in other apps or in a note to someone only to find that it's unusable in various other places.

17

Guess what, the * works but Folder Content Formats is now useless. Just realized it.

Any suggestions?

18

Nope... path formats (even wildcard) take precedence over content type formats :frowning:

A fairly good reason to still lobby for a "temporary / non-persistent" format option...

19

Yeah the lobbying continues, Dr. Perry is seeing this thread right?

It should not be difficult to implement.