4 ms·

After using MacOSX for a decade, I've been using Linux exclusively for 3 weeks now... after my rMBP was stolen and I can't afford a new Mac right now. Of all t

by Jerry2 10y ago

After using MacOSX for a decade, I've been using Linux exclusively for 3 weeks now... after my rMBP was stolen and I can't afford a new Mac right now. Of all the software that I used on a Mac, I have to say that I miss the Finder the most. I've tried every file manager available on Linux (you name it, I've probably tried it) and I can't find anything that's even close to Finder. Nautilus and Nemo are the closest but they are both buggy and are missing a ton of features that I loved in Finder. Everything else just doesn't have the polish or is just missing features that make using Finder such a joy. I remember when I complained about "Classic Finder" and then about missing features in "Cocoa Finder" after the massive rewrite. Looking back, those small issues and warts are nothing when you compare it to what's available on other OSes. Anyway, to appreciate the genius and polish of using Finder, just spend few weeks with other OSes and see how much you'll miss it :)

4ad 10y ago
I am using OS X and the only time I ever fire Finder is when I want to view a bunch of pictures. I never understood how exactly file managers are supposed to help somebody. I never feel the need for a file manager.
Keyframe 10y ago
Funny that. I use OSX, Windows and Linux daily. Most of my time is spent on OSX, then Windows, then Linux (not daily linux though, I lied - every few days). I like preview feature in Finder. It's awesome and I wish every OS had that. Apart from that, Finder must be the only thing that really bothers me on OSX. That and whatever equivalent comes with Fedora/XFCE and Windows Explorer. They are all complete garbage compared to Total Commander. It might be my early exposure to NC and DirOpus, back in the day, but everything else is just magnitudes slower to use. I understand for 'normal' users, something like TC would be hard to use compared to finder/explorer, but for the rest of us I can't understand why would you use anything else.
- rsync 10y ago
  "I like preview feature in Finder. It's awesome and I wish every OS had that." Agreed - the space-bar convention for quick preview and browsing through files is really, really useful. In fact, it's so nice that I can't believe it's still there in a not-yet-wrecked form. Give it some time.
skykooler 10y ago
I like the Pantheon file browser from Elementary OS. But it also doesn't have the "file preview" that Finder does, and I haven't had any luck trying to get Gloobus Preview working with it.
- Jerry2 10y ago
  I noticed that the new ElementaryOS came out just a few days ago. Always wanted to give it a go but haven't had the time. I'll try it in a VM one of these days. Thanks for pointing me ta their file browser... had no idea they put so much work into it.
copperx 10y ago
Agreed. The ability to drag and drop a file or folder into a file dialog is absolutely brilliant, and one of the things I miss the most when I'm on Windows or Linux. I have no idea why other systems haven't adopted that. Do they really expect us to awkwardly navigate the filesystem every time we open or save a file?
- Kadin 10y ago
  I thought you could get a similar behavior in Windows by dragging a folder into the path bar at the top of the 'Save' modal window. (I don't have a Windows machine or VM handy at the moment to test it, though.) You can definitely achieve a similar behavior by Ctrl-C'ing a directory and then Ctrl-V'ing into the File Name text box; the result populates the File Name with the copied directory's path. (Being able to get a folder's full path by copying it and pasting into a textarea is actually pretty nice, and arguably more useful than the Mac convention of grabbing the basename.) Since Apple screwed up the Open/Save dialogs a couple of updates back, I've actually come to appreciate the Windows open/save browser more by comparison. Being able to manipulate files from within Open/Save is a fairly neat trick, as is the ability to pull in remote files from within Open by pointing to a URI. I still can't exactly love Windows as an OS taken as a whole, but Apple's changes haven't improved things.
  - mistersquid 10y ago
    > Since Apple screwed up the Open/Save dialogs a couple of updates back, I've actually come to appreciate the Windows open/save browser more by comparison. Being able to manipulate files from within Open/Save is a fairly neat trick, as is the ability to pull in remote files from within Open by pointing to a URI. I still can't exactly love Windows as an OS taken as a whole, but Apple's changes haven't improved things. Mac OS 10.11 (El Capitan) allows users to manipulate the file system from Open/Save dialogs. Right/ctrl-clicking a file will reveal additional options. I don't think it's possible to put in an arbitrary URI, but if you have a remotely mounted volume you can navigate to those files. From my limited understanding, being able to download a file from an arbitrary URI by invoking an Open/Save dialog seems potentially troublesome, but does seem kinda neat in principle.
rsync 10y ago
"Of all the software that I used on a Mac, I have to say that I miss the Finder the most. I've tried every file manager available on Linux (you name it, I've probably tried it) and I can't find anything that's even close to Finder. Nautilus and Nemo are the closest but they are both buggy and are missing a ton of features that I loved in Finder. Everything else just doesn't have the polish or is just missing features that make using Finder such a joy." Whatever happened to Konqueror ? I remember many (12 ? 10 ?) years ago installing Konqueror as a standalone, non-browser application in a non-KDE Window system and I liked it for the limited time that I used it ... Is that even a thing now or is Konqueror some weird piece of KDE which is itself a weird thing that I don't even try to understand ... ?
- 72deluxe 10y ago
  I remember under 3.5.10 it was brilliant and had loads of handlers for different protocols, was a fairly decent web browser, had useful plugins for generating thumbnails, web pages, was a great file manager for me. But with 4 they ditched it and started Dolphin. I stopped using it about this time. Sad.
  - rsync 10y ago
    Also worth mentioning is the fact that, IIRC, Konqueror had equivalent functions to sshFS built in ... I remember specifying fish:// paths in the path-bar and instantly browsing remote SSH filesystems. This was back in 2004, so I don't believe this was using FUSE...
    - 72deluxe 10y ago
      Yes indeed it did. I used to use this - really really useful. Does it still do this?
      - sangnoir 10y ago
        Not sure about Konqueror, but Dolphin still supports "fish://"
72deluxe 10y ago
Nautilus did a good job of mimicking Finder last time I used it. Same keyboard shortcuts too. Mind you, last time I used it was GNOME2.
lostboys67 10y ago
Interesting I found Finder the worst part of moving to macs I have now moved back to a windows 8 machine (for full fat Excel and better access to VM's). Even windows 3.1's file explorer was more usfull

by Jerry2 10y ago

4ad 10y ago

I am using OS X and the only time I ever fire Finder is when I want to view a bunch of pictures. I never understood how exactly file managers are supposed to help somebody. I never feel the need for a file manager.

Keyframe 10y ago

Funny that. I use OSX, Windows and Linux daily. Most of my time is spent on OSX, then Windows, then Linux (not daily linux though, I lied - every few days). I like preview feature in Finder. It's awesome and I wish every OS had that. Apart from that, Finder must be the only thing that really bothers me on OSX. That and whatever equivalent comes with Fedora/XFCE and Windows Explorer. They are all complete garbage compared to Total Commander. It might be my early exposure to NC and DirOpus, back in the day, but everything else is just magnitudes slower to use. I understand for 'normal' users, something like TC would be hard to use compared to finder/explorer, but for the rest of us I can't understand why would you use anything else.

rsync 10y ago
"I like preview feature in Finder. It's awesome and I wish every OS had that." Agreed - the space-bar convention for quick preview and browsing through files is really, really useful. In fact, it's so nice that I can't believe it's still there in a not-yet-wrecked form. Give it some time.

skykooler 10y ago

I like the Pantheon file browser from Elementary OS. But it also doesn't have the "file preview" that Finder does, and I haven't had any luck trying to get Gloobus Preview working with it.

Jerry2 10y ago
I noticed that the new ElementaryOS came out just a few days ago. Always wanted to give it a go but haven't had the time. I'll try it in a VM one of these days. Thanks for pointing me ta their file browser... had no idea they put so much work into it.

copperx 10y ago

Agreed. The ability to drag and drop a file or folder into a file dialog is absolutely brilliant, and one of the things I miss the most when I'm on Windows or Linux. I have no idea why other systems haven't adopted that. Do they really expect us to awkwardly navigate the filesystem every time we open or save a file?

Kadin 10y ago
I thought you could get a similar behavior in Windows by dragging a folder into the path bar at the top of the 'Save' modal window. (I don't have a Windows machine or VM handy at the moment to test it, though.) You can definitely achieve a similar behavior by Ctrl-C'ing a directory and then Ctrl-V'ing into the File Name text box; the result populates the File Name with the copied directory's path. (Being able to get a folder's full path by copying it and pasting into a textarea is actually pretty nice, and arguably more useful than the Mac convention of grabbing the basename.) Since Apple screwed up the Open/Save dialogs a couple of updates back, I've actually come to appreciate the Windows open/save browser more by comparison. Being able to manipulate files from within Open/Save is a fairly neat trick, as is the ability to pull in remote files from within Open by pointing to a URI. I still can't exactly love Windows as an OS taken as a whole, but Apple's changes haven't improved things.
- mistersquid 10y ago
  > Since Apple screwed up the Open/Save dialogs a couple of updates back, I've actually come to appreciate the Windows open/save browser more by comparison. Being able to manipulate files from within Open/Save is a fairly neat trick, as is the ability to pull in remote files from within Open by pointing to a URI. I still can't exactly love Windows as an OS taken as a whole, but Apple's changes haven't improved things. Mac OS 10.11 (El Capitan) allows users to manipulate the file system from Open/Save dialogs. Right/ctrl-clicking a file will reveal additional options. I don't think it's possible to put in an arbitrary URI, but if you have a remotely mounted volume you can navigate to those files. From my limited understanding, being able to download a file from an arbitrary URI by invoking an Open/Save dialog seems potentially troublesome, but does seem kinda neat in principle.

rsync 10y ago

"Of all the software that I used on a Mac, I have to say that I miss the Finder the most. I've tried every file manager available on Linux (you name it, I've probably tried it) and I can't find anything that's even close to Finder. Nautilus and Nemo are the closest but they are both buggy and are missing a ton of features that I loved in Finder. Everything else just doesn't have the polish or is just missing features that make using Finder such a joy." Whatever happened to Konqueror ? I remember many (12 ? 10 ?) years ago installing Konqueror as a standalone, non-browser application in a non-KDE Window system and I liked it for the limited time that I used it ... Is that even a thing now or is Konqueror some weird piece of KDE which is itself a weird thing that I don't even try to understand ... ?

72deluxe 10y ago
I remember under 3.5.10 it was brilliant and had loads of handlers for different protocols, was a fairly decent web browser, had useful plugins for generating thumbnails, web pages, was a great file manager for me. But with 4 they ditched it and started Dolphin. I stopped using it about this time. Sad.
- rsync 10y ago
  Also worth mentioning is the fact that, IIRC, Konqueror had equivalent functions to sshFS built in ... I remember specifying fish:// paths in the path-bar and instantly browsing remote SSH filesystems. This was back in 2004, so I don't believe this was using FUSE...
  - 72deluxe 10y ago
    Yes indeed it did. I used to use this - really really useful. Does it still do this?
    - sangnoir 10y ago
      Not sure about Konqueror, but Dolphin still supports "fish://"

72deluxe 10y ago

Nautilus did a good job of mimicking Finder last time I used it. Same keyboard shortcuts too. Mind you, last time I used it was GNOME2.

lostboys67 10y ago

Interesting I found Finder the worst part of moving to macs I have now moved back to a windows 8 machine (for full fat Excel and better access to VM's). Even windows 3.1's file explorer was more usfull