XYplorer Beta Club

I always have the 'auto-calculate folder sizes' feature activated.

But, I would dearly like there to be an option to show the amount of files in the folder as well.
Since the folder sizes are already calculated, the amount of files is also known (and therefore
basically free, performance wise).

Please consider adding this super-useful feature.

iycgtptyarvg wrote:Please consider adding this super-useful feature.

You are the first to ask for it.

Where would you want to see this info? Probably in a separate column for sorting?

admin wrote:Where would you want to see this info? Probably in a separate column for sorting?

Why not incorporate it into existing 'Size' column in a format like 'AAAF / BBB', where AAA is number of files in that folder and BBB is size that's already calculated? So example would be '250F / 100,470 KB'. And a column context menu tick to change sorting either by file quantity or size

admin wrote:

iycgtptyarvg wrote:Please consider adding this super-useful feature.

You are the first to ask for it.

Not true, I'm pretty sure I mentioned how I would like to get the number of files/folders inside listed folders a while back, probably on the IP|Properties, maybe on a column as well, and of course/especially for use with report().

jacky wrote:

admin wrote:

iycgtptyarvg wrote:Please consider adding this super-useful feature.

You are the first to ask for it.

Not true, I'm pretty sure I mentioned how I would like to get the number of files/folders inside listed folders a while back,

I'll confirm jacky's opinion, as I'm quite sure that I've seen this request at least a couple of times over the years...finding those posts in all the ones here will be a challenge though...heck, I think I may have even asked for it myself!

zer0 wrote:

admin wrote:Where would you want to see this info? Probably in a separate column for sorting?

Why not incorporate it into existing 'Size' column in a format like 'AAAF / BBB', where AAA is number of files in that folder and BBB is size that's already calculated? So example would be '250F / 100,470 KB'. And a column context menu tick to change sorting either by file quantity or size

I think having a totally new & separate col would give most flexability and also formatting two fields into one could be a problem so that they line up and don't appear 'ragged' and thus less readable.

j_c_hallgren wrote:I think having a totally new & separate col would give most flexability and also formatting two fields into one could be a problem so that they line up and don't appear 'ragged' and thus less readable.

I'm afraid this is correct.
And what about sorting of a field with 2 values...

Hold it folks, this can get very complicated. Let's not forget that, be default, folders are sorted apart from files. Also, this 'File Count' column, if it will be a column, will only apply to folders and not files. Let's also keep in mind that we have 'Manual Sorting' as a feature. And, of course, we can't sort by two columns or have certain files/foldes sorted by certain criteria and others not.

So picture this scenario:

Sort by name then by file count. Enable manual sorting and drag a few files around. One thing would happen -- the list will still be sorted by 'File Count', since that won't apply to files, just the folders. Also navigating away and then back to that folder normally puts things back to where they were, but that won't return files to being sorted by name because List is sorted by 'File Count'.

So, considering that folders are sorted separately by default anyway, why not have that switch in context menu so folders can be sorted either by size of file count or amount of space they take up? That way when sorting folders you have flexibility and files will be sorted by size anyway.

P.S. I am only wary of having columns that apply to certain items in the List and not others. That's why I don't have 'Ext' column showing, because XY's 'Name' column includes those anyway

zer0 wrote:So, considering that folders are sorted separately by default anyway, why not have that switch in context menu so folders can be sorted either by size of file count or amount of space they take up? That way when sorting folders you have flexibility and files will be sorted by size anyway.

Why would it need to be in a context menu? If they are separate columns, just sorting by each col would work.

Any files would simply be sorted together as they would have a null file count.

j_c_hallgren wrote:Why would it need to be in a context menu? If they are separate columns, just sorting by each col would work.

Because size can be defined in both quantity of files and total amount of disk space. Just look in your XYplorer status bar. In the left-most section, it should say "XX files (XXX.XX GB/MB/whateverB free), right? Having it in the context menu would allow a person to specify whether to sort by count or by amount when sorting by size? There's your flexibility

j_c_hallgren wrote:Any files would simply be sorted together as they would have a null file count.

Why would they be sorted if they have a null file count? What criteria will they be sorted by? Alphabetical? What if I manually shuffle them about and then want to sort in reverse file count size? Will my files be resorted in alphabetical order or will they be excluded from sorting in this situation? They shouldn't be...

i vote for having a separate culumn for file count, since that would give us much more flexibility.

zer0 wrote:And, of course, we can't sort by two columns

actually, we can.
it's called secondary sorting.
hold shift when cilcking the column header.

zer0 wrote:Why would they be sorted if they have a null file count? What criteria will they be sorted by? Alphabetical? What if I manually shuffle them about and then want to sort in reverse file count size? Will my files be resorted in alphabetical order or will they be excluded from sorting in this situation? They shouldn't be...

alphabetical, i think.
for example, sort by modified date then by ext.
now the files are sorted alphabetically for each extension group.
it looks like xy uses the name column for secondary sorting by default.

zer0 wrote:

j_c_hallgren wrote:Why would it need to be in a context menu? If they are separate columns, just sorting by each col would work.

Because size can be defined in both quantity of files and total amount of disk space. Just look in your XYplorer status bar. In the left-most section, it should say "XX files (XXX.XX GB/MB/whateverB free), right? Having it in the context menu would allow a person to specify whether to sort by count or by amount when sorting by size? There's your flexibility

But remember that the status bar only shows ONE entry...when there are multiple items, separate columns are required for formatting purposes, so thus context menu doesn't apply...I agree they are both within the 'size' group but they are unique values and need to kept as such when shown in a list.

The latest utility that I found/use is Glary Utilities (http://www.glaryutilities.com/gu.html) which has a Disk Analysis utility...(check it out if you've not!)...it has "Size" and "Files" columns and you can sort by either one...so I'd suggest the same for XY.

And as to sort sequence: It's no different if you have numerous files of 0KB when you sort by size now..these would simply be separate from those...and a manual shuffle is not a sort as i recall so that doesn't apply.

Muroph wrote:actually, we can.
it's called secondary sorting.
hold shift when cilcking the column header.

That's only if the primary and secondary sorting criteria don't clash. For example, Size and Type. Sometimes they might, like with Date Modified and Date Created. It's not possible to have files sorted by reverse earliest creation that were modified 1 day ago.

Muroph wrote:alphabetical, i think.
for example, sort by modified date then by ext.
now the files are sorted alphabetically for each extension group.

Then why sort by modified date in the first place? Sorting by extension would mess up that sorting and secondary sorting by extension makes no difference.

I was thinking of a simple extra column (just like in Directory Opus) called 'Tot Files'.

zer0 wrote:

Muroph wrote:alphabetical, i think.
for example, sort by modified date then by ext.
now the files are sorted alphabetically for each extension group.

Then why sort by modified date in the first place? Sorting by extension would mess up that sorting and secondary sorting by extension makes no difference.

Because he could want it broken down by date and then Ext...and no, it wouldn't mess it up...I could easily have numerous diff ext that I'd modified on a given day and if I wanted to have my TXT, DOC, RTF, etc grouped that way within each modified date, then secondary sort makes perfect sense.

j_c_hallgren wrote:Because he could want it broken down by date and then Ext...and no, it wouldn't mess it up...I could easily have numerous diff ext that I'd modified on a given day and if I wanted to have my TXT, DOC, RTF, etc grouped that way within each modified date, then secondary sort makes perfect sense.

That's not what Muroph said though

Muroph wrote:for example, sort by modified date then by ext.

He said that first sorting is to be done by modified date (primary) and then extension (secondary). You're saying to sort by extension first (primary) and then modified date (secondary). Your way works, his does not.