Version 1.2.1 released

[bchuter]

@Darek

Most certainly will send Ghisler a mail!!
hopefully it gets bumped.

@Mike
Ive just come across another feature that would be helpful.
So with TC you can save your settings and then actually make a backup of that file.
When deploying TC onto all your other PC's (I have many) you can easily restore your settings the way you like your TC setup.
So it occurred to me today when i loaded up NC onto my iMac that it would be nice to replicate all the work i did on my Macbook Pro to get NC
configured the way i like it. So i see you do have the option to export the theme (this has helped) it would be useful to have a global export feature that exports all settings in NC to a file so that you can restore this onto any other copy of NC you have running.
I dont mean to critique your work in any way so please dont think that all my suggestions are anything but just constructive suggestions for future features. I really love your app and would love to see it grow!

[bchuter]

@Darek

my mail to Ghisler below :

Hi Ghisler

I would like to ask you a favor.

On your site you have suggested alternatives for MAC users.
Having used TC for 15years plus (I purchased my license back then) its something I can’t do without on a daily basis on my PC’s

I have recently moved over to MAC (I still use PC’s at work so I still actively use TC) I was struggling to find a comparable alternative to TC.
Naturally I saw your suggested apps on your site and not knowing any of them I naturally started at the top of the list.
Having sort of liked CRAX I blindly purchased it but have since regretted doing so as it seems development on this one stopped in 2016.
The one thing in common with all the other suggested apps is that they are very SLOW and resource intensive! And offer some but not all TC features.
The closest one is Nimble Commander and it is really lightweight and FAST!!!
Even better is the fact that it is very actively being developed by its creator (Mike)

Having said all the above I would like to make it clear that I have no affiliation with Nimble Commander or its creator.
I simply want to point out what my experience has been and I must say that Nimble Commander is by far the best alternative to TC.

I would really appreciate it if you could bump this app up to the first suggestion on your site.
I only came across it after trying all the others in your list and naturally I started at the top of the list.

There is no doubt in my mind that Nimble Commander should be at the top of that list!!

Many thanks
Bradley Chuter

[darek]

@Bradley I've sent one as well, earlier today. And Christian Ghisler already replied, saying that since he doesn't own a Mac, he's simply listing the tool in alphabetical order. I've argued that this sounds fair on the surface, but people (your case included) are still thinking they're in relevance order, so this is worth considering.

I've also sent him a link to this forum, including this specific post, so he'll be able to see what we're talking about.

Anyways, I just want to help the next poor soul, who like me (and you!) has used TC on Windows for most of their life and now's looking for a good replacement on Mac. I've been waiting for a good tool since 2008 and finally NC delivered. It would be a shame for other people to be dragged through the CRAX Experience(tm) first, when they can skip directly to the good part

[bchuter]

@Darek

Great stuff!!

Lets hope after getting my mail after yours, Ghisler rethinks that, and adds NC to the TOP!

@Mike

After going through the forum in more depth I see you have a issue tracker on GitHub
I have registered and see some of my previous suggestions have already been asked,
2 that were not, i have added to your GitHub tracker.

[bchuter]

I have purchased the license for NC now!

[sasha]

... the CRAX Experience(tm) ...

Darek, you made my day

Personally, I'm not a big fan of advertisement like "...best TC alternative for Mac". A really sleazy example is the Commander One website, where they even have a "Approved by Christian Ghisler as Total Commander for Mac" badge - which is really misleading. It's already a nice gesture of Christian Ghisler to mention other projects on his website, I think there's no need to ask him to bump it up in that list. NC and all the other usual suspects can be easily found online and most of them have a trial version so you don't have to buy it right away. At least for me, going through the CRAX Experience (tm) made me appreciate NC even more

Welcome to the forum, bchuter!

[mike]

Folks, thanks, I'm flattered, honestly
Darek is absolutely right about NC's promotion - I'm absolutely dumb in marketing and all that stuff.

I come from a Windows environment of many years using Total Commander.
I have only very recently started using MAC's and ive been finding it very difficult to find a suitable alternative.
NC seems to be the closest thing i have now found to TC and after fixing a few hot keys to fit with my old habits on TC

I want to warn you a bit here - NC was never intended to be a drop-in replacement for TC on Mac, so some UX patterns might differ significantly. At this moment, it has a fusion of approaches from Finder, TC and FAR with couple of others, heavily sprinkled with "Developer UI".
Welcome to the forum, by the way

Also, he's coming from a game development background, which makes him appreciate optimization and performance.

Indeed, and sometimes this background makes me wonder like this when I stumble upon some app which has a sluggish UI running on the modern hardware with all these freaking gigaflops, megahertz, gigabytes and a triple-layered hardware-accelerated graphics.

1. Can you implement a copy queue. F5 to copy and F2 to start copy in a queue then doing any other copy and adding to queue continues to add to the end of the queue (like Total Commander )

It's on its way. A preview build of v1.2.2 already has a concept of operations queue, with a default concurrency set to 5 operations, next build will allow to alter this value. When this value is set to 1, any subsequent file operation will wait in the queue until previous one is done.

2. Allow selection of external compression tool or selection of different file formats. For instance allowing to use an external archiver or allow us to select different archive formats like 7z etc.

Yep, will do in the future. It just needs to be written.

3. I use "space" mapped as hotkey for "File Panels->Toggle Selection". could you add in preferences the option to calculate folder size when using the toggle selection (same as "alt+shift+return")

To rephrase it - you mean an option which will automatically trigger a size calculation upon selection of an item, right?

So it occurred to me today when i loaded up NC onto my iMac that it would be nice to replicate all the work i did on my Macbook Pro to get NC
configured the way i like it. So i see you do have the option to export the theme (this has helped) it would be useful to have a global export feature that exports all settings in NC to a file so that you can restore this onto any other copy of NC you have running.

You can do it already - just grab a config file and put it on the new machine.
Take a look here: ~/Library/Application Support/Nimble Commander/Config.

the CRAX Experience(tm)

Darek, you made my day

Guys, this is harsh

[bchuter]

To rephrase it - you mean an option which will automatically trigger a size calculation upon selection of an item, right?

Absolutely correct

I want to warn you a bit here - NC was never intended to be a drop-in replacement for TC on Mac, so some UX patterns might differ significantly

Understood

It's on its way. A preview build of v1.2.2 already has a concept of operations queue, with a default concurrency set to 5 operations, next build will allow to alter this value. When this value is set to 1, any subsequent file operation will wait in the queue until previous one is done.

Can you explain more how this works ? I'm already running your preview build
Does this happen automatically ? by this i mean, you start a copy, then just simply start another.....and it by default then adds the second to a queue ?
The way im used to this (in TC) is to hit F5 to copy, the copy menu comes up and within that menu popup you have the option to just continue to copy as usual or hit F2 at this point to indicate that this copy needs to be added to the queue.....you can then start your next copy by either skipping the queue (even while the other queue is busy) or on the second copy chose F2 again to indicate you want this copy to be added to the queue as well....so there is a choice on each copy whether to add to queue or not. Im fine with the auto approach if this is what you have done just need clarity on how you are implementing it

You can do it already - just grab a config file and put it on the new machine.
Take a look here: ~/Library/Application Support/Nimble Commander/Config.

Thanks for this!! Very helpful

[mike]

Can you explain more how this works ? I'm already running your preview build
Does this happen automatically ? by this i mean, you start a copy, then just simply start another.....and it by default then adds the second to a queue ?
The way im used to this (in TC) is to hit F5 to copy, the copy menu comes up and within that menu popup you have the option to just continue to copy as usual or hit F2 at this point to indicate that this copy needs to be added to the queue.....you can then start your next copy by either skipping the queue (even while the other queue is busy) or on the second copy chose F2 again to indicate you want this copy to be added to the queue as well....so there is a choice on each copy whether to add to queue or not. Im fine with the auto approach if this is what you have done just need clarity on how you are implementing it

Oh, this value (5 allowed concurrent operations per window) is hardcoded now - there's no UI or config path to alter it.
You can check an effect right now, although an it would be seen only on 6th operation - it will be queued for later execution.
So there's no special hotkey to add an operation to the queue instead of starting it immediately.

[swoop]

I'm already running your preview build

Uh, oh? Did I miss something? Probably, I blinked. Holidays, eh!