It's been a while, but I finally got a chance to spend some quality time with Directory Opus this morning, and it reminded me of a couple of things I've never figured out.
This is one of them.
I usually launch a new lister by double-clicking the tray icon, which opens my saved default lister:
But when I launch a lister from the desktop or by using the "Open New Lister" command in the context menu of the tray icon, I get this instead:
... a dual-display lister, non-maximized, that shows the C: drive in both Source and Destination.
I edited the raw command for "Open New Lister" and changed it from
Go NEW
to
Go /mycomputer LAYOUT="My Default Lister"
... but I've always wondered what that second lister is and if there's a way to configure Opus to call my default lister from the desktop instead.
GO LAYOUT is similar to using the Prefs LAYOUT command except that only the first Lister in the specified Layout is used, and you can use all the other parameters of the Go command to override settings from the Layout.
Good call on the raw command, Christiaan — thanks for pointing that out.
As for the desktop, I don't use double-click to launch Opus from the desktop. (That option is disabled.) Instead, I right-click on the desktop and use the "New Lister" option (which is presumably just "Go NEW").
I wonder if there's any way to redefine "NEW" ... .
When I right click the desktop -> New Lister, DOpus loads the DEFAULT lister ...
To save your current Lister as the Default Lister, use the Set As Default Lister option in the default Settings menu.
Behind the scenes, the Default Lister is just like a Saved Layout - except that it contains only one Lister, and it does not appear in the Layouts list. In all other respects it behaves exactly like a Layout and is in fact handled internally in exactly the same way.
Any time a Lister is opened other than via a saved Layout (with one proviso – the Go NEW command can optionally override Lister settings), the Default Lister is used.
I suspect "Go NEW" is being used, since I see the same lister when I click on the desktop as I did when I clicked on the "New Lister" menu item in the tray icon's context menu (which had the raw command "Go NEW").
Confirmed. (That's how I got my current "My Default Lister" which opens from a double-click on the context menu.)
Nothing pressing about this — but I've always wondered why my default lister doesn't get called when using the built-in "New Lister" command.
Have a look at the screenshot below: Go New loads the DEFAULT lister.
But this is the 'internal' default lister. Even if you save your current layout as DEFAULT (i mean: a new lister-layout with the name DEFAULT)
using Settings -> Lister Layouts -> Save this lister ... the Internal DEFAULT lister doesn't change! To change the internal DEFAULT lister
you must use the Set As Default Lister option in the default Settings menu.
Wish I could take credit, but it's part of the improved Tiles view of My Computer in Vista.
For what it's worth, I usually rely on the drive space indicators on the Opus status bar, which can be configured (Preferences » Display » Status Bar) to show all sorts of information. Mine (as seen in the lower right of the second screenshot) is based on this string:
<b>{dlet}</b>\ <b>{bg}</b>{du} of {dt} in use, {df} ({pf}%) free
[quote="Christiaan"]Have a look at the screenshot below: Go New loads the DEFAULT lister.
But this is the 'internal' default lister. Even if you save your current layout as DEFAULT (i mean: a new lister-layout with the name DEFAULT)
using Settings -> Lister Layouts -> Save this lister ... the Internal DEFAULT lister doesn't change! To change the internal DEFAULT lister
you must use the Set As Default Lister option in the default Settings menu.[/quote]
Good thought, but I can confirm that the layout seen in my first screenshot (which is actually saved as "Scott's Default Lister") has actually been set as the default lister using the Prefs SETDEFAULTLISTER button.
Maybe that isn't sticking for some reason? As far as I can tell, Go NEW always loads the internal default lister and never the one I saved and set as the default ... .
Double-clicking the tray icon is set to open a layout called "Scott's Default Lister", not the default lister. On the other hand, the "New Lister" menu item does open the default lister. So it doesn't seem unusual that the two do different things since they're set to open different things.
Putting "Default Lister" in a layout name doesn't make it the default lister, of course, so I'll pretend the layout is called "Scott's Layout" from now on instead, to avoid confusion.
When you save something as the default lister you are saving that window's current settings as the default lister. You don't save a particular layout as the default lister, though. That is, if you open a layout (e.g. "Scott's Layout") and then save that window as the default lister, the fact it came from "Scott's Layout" is not remembered. If you then change "Scott's Layout" you are only changing that layout and it will have no affect on the default lister. The only way to change the default lister is to save over it.
All of which makes sense, but I can't seem to change the default lister from the one shown above (second screenshot in the original post).
For example, I can open the Saved Layout called "Scott's Default Lister" and hit the "Set as Default Lister" button. I get a confirmation dialog, confirm the change, and get a second dialog saying the default lister has been overwritten — but when I call the "New Lister" function from the desktop context menu, the same old lister is opened.
Likewise, I can open a lister manually (without using a saved layout) and try to set it as the Default Lister, but the same thing happens: The original dual-lister layout pointed at C: (shown above) opens up.
It's hardly a major issue — but I am glad to hear from you guys that it's not supposed to behave that way.
Is the default lister saved in a single file somewhere? Perhaps it's set to read-only and not being properly overwritten?
I renamed one of my saved Layouts to default.oll and copied it to [i]C:\ProgramData\GPSoftware\Directory Opus\Layouts\System[/i] to test it for you. It works, no problems so far ...
When I delete default.oll and try to save the current lister as default lister, DOpus just creates a new default.oll file ...
In the past people's profile folders have had their permissions messed up, or been set to Read-Only, which has broken stuff in Opus (and other programs). Check if you can manually create a new text file in that folder, perhaps.
Christiaan's path is only right for people using shared configuration mode and on Vista.