File Find dialog - enhancements [DONE]

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achekulaev
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File Find dialog - enhancements [DONE]

Post by achekulaev » Sat Jul 25, 2015 1:13 am

1) Access keys
As an advanced keyboard user I'm missing access keys in find files dialog. Like here https://dl.dropbox.com/s/6q4z04s163nfpr ... 6.png?dl=0

Pressing Cmd+(access key) should focus corresponding field and select it's value.
Access key I need the most is to access "Containing text" field quickly and to click 'View" button. At the moment I have to navigate results with keyboard and then reach for mouse to click "View" on a search result.

2) "Feed to listbox" functionality
I won't describe long as I guess everyone knows what it is about. Feeding search results into a new panel where file operations can happen on them

don
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Re: File Find dialog - enhancements

Post by don » Sat Jul 25, 2015 12:59 pm

Strongly support the second item - would use it a lot.

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darek
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Re: File Find dialog - enhancements

Post by darek » Sat Jul 25, 2015 3:31 pm

1) Accelerators and shortcuts is the area that Windows got very right. Keyboard handling in OS X is rather weak. They often say it's good, but really it isn't. I shudder when I recall the story of Steve trying to get rid of arrow keys on the keyboard, because "mouse is good enough for cursor positioning". Yeah... I'm glad they've talked him out of this ;) Anyway, I've been able to do more using keyboard only in Windows then I can do on Mac. So I'm happy to see that Mike is trying to fix some of the issues. He actually hacked dialog windows in Files to achieve something like you wanted. There's even a tooltip for that:
find_files.png
find_files.png (94.55 KiB) Viewed 14797 times
So Ctrl+T does it. Although CMD+T would probably be easier, but I'm not sure whether there was a technical limitation and Mike had to use Ctrl?

2) Feed to list box -- oh boy, yes! This is a huge thing, crazily useful, and from what I've heard Mike has it on his list. Hopefully it will come soon enough :)

But yeah, both of these are things I've used *heavily* in Total Commander and I miss them dearly in Files.

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mike
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Re: File Find dialog - enhancements

Post by mike » Tue Jul 28, 2015 6:29 am

achekulaev,
Access keys are bound to Ctrl modifier, since it happens to be problematic to use same modifiers as for Menu items (seems to be a Cocoa-specific behaviour). There're:
- ^M for Mask
- ^T for Containing Text
- ^S - for Size
I will eventually bring the similar scheme to other dialog sheet someday, currently it is used in Batch Rename and Find Files sheets.

"Feed to listbox" is a feature that I miss much too :)
It's definitely in some nearby plans, but surprisingly it requires a huge refactoring of Files internals.
( currently every listing in Files is a content of a single directory - real or VFS )

don
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Re: File Find dialog - enhancements

Post by don » Tue Jul 28, 2015 9:34 am

Pardon my ignorance, but I am missing how could I bring this dialog up?
I mean the finding files dialog?

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mike
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Re: File Find dialog - enhancements

Post by mike » Tue Jul 28, 2015 10:48 am

don wrote:Pardon my ignorance, but I am missing how could I bring this dialog up?
I mean the finding files dialog?
Hmm, cmd+F ?

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darek
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Re: File Find dialog - enhancements

Post by darek » Tue Jul 28, 2015 10:50 am

...or File -> Find :) Just like in Finder.

don
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Re: File Find dialog - enhancements

Post by don » Wed Jul 29, 2015 10:21 am

I am new to mac and my ignorance is limitless.
I did not know that Finder could do that. I am trying to avoid it at all costs - using Files and the command line.

Thank you - indeed it fixes yet another problem for me.

don
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Re: File Find dialog - enhancements

Post by don » Wed Jul 29, 2015 10:28 am

Another enchancement request.

Would it be possible to group "Containing text" field with " With size" and place them immediately under search for files?

That would render the following benefits:

- Defining typical search would required only a few "tab" presses. Right now it is a lot - just to get to the fields.
The defaults for the tickboxes and the text encoding are chosen correctly - I will see a rare need to change them. As such they can be deprioritized in terms of UI.

- The tickbox and encoding layout can be optimized, all 4 tickboxes could be grouped together on two lines.

So this way to perform a typical search I would need to do:
Command - F, type extention (*.java), Tab, type text, Enter.

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mike
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Re: File Find dialog - enhancements

Post by mike » Thu Jul 30, 2015 1:44 pm

don,
I'm a bit against such regrouping since a lot users prefer mouse access and visual structure is important IMHO.
As for keyboard-only access - how about this (already available):
- cmd+F
- type extention (*.java)
- ctrl+T
- type text
- Enter
What do you think, can this be faster than hitting Tab thrice?

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