New user and am totally lost

I literally just purchased Directory Opus 10 Pro from BitsduJour the other day and so far this program has been nothing but frustrating for me to the point where I am -sorry to say- sad that I bought it. I'm saying this because I can not seem to customize it to my liking.

I have been a Powerdesk Pro user all these years and I got costumed to how things were done on that program and I stopped using it when Powerdesk started adding unneeded stuff to justify another program update.

What I want to do in Directory Opus is to have the ability to add a toolbar where I can place the icons of the programs that I use a lot so I can access them easier. I have seen screenshots of other people's Opus setups and I see that this can be done. I just do not know how.

I also want the program to recognize my DVD and Blu-ray drives when I start the program. It only recognizes it when something is in the drive. These drives are always recognized in Powerdesk and I am sure that there is a way to do it here. Again I have no idea.

Also every single time I start Opus I have to turn off the ATTRIBUTES as depicted in this screen shot. How in the world can I have this turned off permanently so I never have to see it again?


I have spent hours reading about this program in the help files but I am lost. Any help is appreciated.

That´s easy: just right click on an empty space on the toolbar, then choose "customize". In that mode you can drag your programs into a toolbar (note, that you can define own toolbars, make them floating, etc.).

in the said customize mode, you will find two items, called drive buttons; You can go into the edit mode, right clicking the second drive buttons item. There you should find the "hideempty" parameter, which is responsible for hiding your empty drives. If you remove that parameter, you should be able to always see those drives (make sure to apply your change, before quitting the customize mode).

[quote]Also every single time I start Opus I have to turn off the ATTRIBUTES as depicted in this screen shot. How in the world can I have this turned off permanently so I never have to see it again?
[attachment=0]2013-05-13_210219.jpg[/attachment][/quote]

Very likely those attributes come from some of the folder formats, a feature that is very useful, but can be confusing at the beginning. Have a look in these FAQs:

[url]Folder Formats: Quick Guide]
[url]Folder Formats: Detailed Guide]

With a feature rich program like Opus, it takes quite a little time to find out about the vast quantity of possibilities. That´s why it comes with the most basic features after you´ve installed it, so that users are not too overwhelmed with the large amount of available settings. So, basically it´s a good starting point to read through some FAQs, & of course you can always ask here in the forum. It´s better, by the way, to open a single thread for each new question, because it makes it easier to follow one topic or search for stuff.

Here is a screen grab showing how to create a new toolbar which you can subsequently customise with your own buttons and menus. Click Settings --> Customize Toolbars then click the New Toolbar icon or press Alt-N.


Regards, AB

Concerning the attributes, you can hover your mouse cursor over the lock symbol at the bottom right, which will show a tooltip. That tooltip will tell you, from which formats the attributes column is coming from.
(see section 6 in the second FAQ)
You can find those folder formats in -> settings -> preferences -> folders -> folder formats under "standard formats" (assuming, you have no other different formats defined yet, which
would show up in the other categories, like wild card formats, file type formats etc.). Once you found the format responsible for the attribute column, you can edit that peculiar format.

This is an example of what you see when you hover your mouse pointer over the format lock..


So now you can bring up the format editor to change the Default Format to suit your personal preferences.


Note that "Custom" is the Default Format.
Now make and save the changes you want. For example, select Attributes and click the "remove" button as shown.


Regards, AB

I forgot to mention that after making changes to a format, you will have to exit from the relevant folder and then reopen it in order to see the effect of your changes.

Regards, AB

Thank you very much. Some progress has been made and I have been able to fix two of the three questions I had. I have now been able to create a custom toolbar and have placed some program shortcuts in there to use. That's done.

I've also been able to get rid of the attributes display that I didn't want. That's good.

However I still can not get the program to recognize all my drives like my DVD and blu-ray drive. I was told to follow this advice by abr:

As you can see by this screenshot I did go in the customize mode and I did find where it said drive buttons but I have no idea where the EDIT mode is. None whatsoever.


[ul][li]The suggestions to add a "hideempty" parameter would only be useful if you have added drive buttons to your toolbars, which I don't think applies (judging from the default toolbars shown in the first post's screenshot).

If you want to make Opus show empty drives in the folder tree and/or when viewing the Computer folder, go to Settings -> Preferences and then type empty drive into the search field at the bottom left. It will then show the two pages with the options you want to toggle for the tree and Computer folder.




[/li]
[li]For the question about the Attributes column, please see the Folder Formats: Quick Guide for simple step-by-step instructions.

[/li]
[li]Please also ask one question per thread if you need any more help (unless the questions are closely related, of course).[/li][/ul]

I am getting closer. As you can seen in the screenshot I have the drives shown now on the right. How can I have them show up on the left side for me (where the arrow is) ? I would like this somehow to be displayed permanently.


Same option in "Folder tree" section...

Same option in "Folder tree" section...[/quote]

Thank you very much. Perfect explanation and all three of my questions have been answered. If I have different ones I will create a new thread. Thank you again AlbatorV and all the others who helped me in here. I have so much to learn. I've only owned Opus 10 Pro four days now and I want to get better at it.

The beauty of Opus is that there is a seemingly never ending supply of interesting and useful things can be done with it. Even after years of use I still come across new gems on a regular basis, many of them triggered by Q&A on these forums.

Regards, AB