What makes XY your favorite filemgr?

[MBaas]

As a novice, I'm still learning new features every day and am still busy setting and re-configuring my working-environment. Hopefully I can accelerate that process through this discussion ;-)
What I'd like to now is your favourite feature(s) of XY that help in master your daily routine more efficiently. Would be happy to hear some "success stories" and inspirational ideas ;-)

My usage scenario is that I'm a software-developer, working with APLon Desktop- and Web-Apps. So 75% of my file-activities occur in a few directories only, and most of them already found their place in the catalog which I have put to the right side of the screen. Plus an item which activates a filter on files modified today. For few of my most often launched apps I addded user-buttons to the toolbar, with the friendly help of this forum also was able to addd some UDCs for directory comparison (left/right-pane) and file-editing.
I'm a long-time user of TakeCommand(back from the days when it was called "4Dos" and worked under MS-DOS!), so I also have a few scripts that I often se (also UDCs) to ZIP-Files (using 7Zip, edited today OR selected) etc.

But surely much more customization and integration is possible, so...what do you do?? ;-)

I'm currently not so happy with ZIPs which feel a bit like "2nd class-citizens" (I know other FMs which treat them transparently like folders, so extracting/adding files all happens within the usual environment) and I think I have more to learn about the power of the address-bar, perhaps also wrt launching of apps?

[bdeshi]

check out the Portable Open With Menu/Portable File Associations. I've associated it with CTRL+ENTER and I can run custom commands on a file or folder, dynamically adjusted to match currently selected item, path and so on.
Some of the most useful options I have are: Run in Cmdprompt - for those "pesky" programs that throw up cmdprompt and die immediately, Run with arguments - same but I supply cmdline arguments in an inputbox etc. Further, as I often do AutoHotkey/AutoIt coding, I have custom options for that too: Run the script or edit in script editor. You can also have location-based items there!
Catalog: for me the catalog is a repository of small cmds (such as one that serves current folder to localhost:randomport) and specialized launchers: like depending on selection, open BeyondCompare for current files/folders in two panes, SmartGit to open current folder a a repo if a .git folder exists, etc.

And the script/helper utilities - these make XYplorer a, what can I say, a factory of power tools!

[admin]

The relatively new MDBU on icons (Configuration | Mouse Down Blow Up | On file icons as well) is something I use all day long.

And without color coded file dates, and file age display I would be like blind.

[highend]

On the transition to Arch Linux, so a scripts only setup...

My favorite fm because of Don, who implements functions on request and fixes bugs in no time

[ksarnelli]

The relatively new MDBU on icons (Configuration | Mouse Down Blow Up | On file icons as well) is something I use all day long.

And without color coded file dates, and file age display I would be like blind.

I use color filters for files based on file age, but the wording in your post got me thinking. A great feature would be the ability to apply color filters to the modified/created columns in details view based on file time/age/etc. That would free up the file name column for other types of color filters (except when in a non-details view).

[admin]

But then you would give up file time/age color coding in non-details views (no date columns).

[TheQwerty]

I use color filters for files based on file age, but the wording in your post got me thinking. A great feature would be the ability to apply color filters to the modified/created columns in details view based on file time/age/etc. That would free up the file name column for other types of color filters (except when in a non-details view).

You can achieve this to some degree today by making use of the m (for merge) switch. This allows you to combine the background color of one filter with the text color of another.

Code: Select all

+0d //m|>,263238
+1d //m|>,607D8B
+2d //m|>,CFD8DC
+3d //m|>,212121
+4d //m|>,9E9E9E
+5d //m|>,E0E0E0
+6d //m|>,3E2723
+7d //m|>,795548
+ageM: < 1 d>FF5722,
+ageM: <= 1 d>F44336,
+ageM: <= 2 d>9C27B0,
+ageM: <= 3 d>673AB7,
+ageM: <= 4 d>3F51B5,
+ageM: <= 5 d>2196F3,
+ageM: <= 6 d>4CAF50,
+ageM: <= 7 d>8BC34A,

2016-03-01 071945.png

Of course the hard part is finding colors that work well together and don't make your XYplorer look like a box of crayons left out in the sun.

[ksarnelli]

But then you would give up file time/age color coding in non-details views (no date columns).

I think that maybe to use this behavior there would have to be some sort of option that says "Apply this color filter to column X, if visible", otherwise it would be applied to the file name.

[ksarnelli]

I use color filters for files based on file age, but the wording in your post got me thinking. A great feature would be the ability to apply color filters to the modified/created columns in details view based on file time/age/etc. That would free up the file name column for other types of color filters (except when in a non-details view).

You can achieve this to some degree today by making use of the m (for merge) switch. This allows you to combine the background color of one filter with the text color of another.

Code: Select all

+0d //m|>,263238
+1d //m|>,607D8B
+2d //m|>,CFD8DC
+3d //m|>,212121
+4d //m|>,9E9E9E
+5d //m|>,E0E0E0
+6d //m|>,3E2723
+7d //m|>,795548
+ageM: < 1 d>FF5722,
+ageM: <= 1 d>F44336,
+ageM: <= 2 d>9C27B0,
+ageM: <= 3 d>673AB7,
+ageM: <= 4 d>3F51B5,
+ageM: <= 5 d>2196F3,
+ageM: <= 6 d>4CAF50,
+ageM: <= 7 d>8BC34A,

2016-03-01 071945.png

Of course the hard part is finding colors that work well together and don't make your XYplorer look like a box of crayons left out in the sun.

I played around with the merge option, but it did indeed make my XY look like a melted rainbow It's a cool feature, but difficult to apply practically when you have a bunch of color filters.

[admin]

But then you would give up file time/age color coding in non-details views (no date columns).

I think that maybe to use this behavior there would have to be some sort of option that says "Apply this color filter to column X, if visible", otherwise it would be applied to the file name.

Maybe. But frankly I'm not planning anything here in the next time.