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OS X Businesses Operating Systems Apple

A Better Finder? 490

Posted by michael from the falling-on-deaf-ears dept.
Build6 writes "Ars Technica opens today with another one of their deeply-thought-out articles relating to MacOS X issues, pointing out another thing which the old MacOS had and the current one doesn't."
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A Better Finder? More

A Better Finder?

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  • Evil bit support (Score:3, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday April 02, 2003 @11:09AM (#5644312)
    pointing out another thing which the old MacOS had and the current one doesn't.

    Evil bit support? Support for the One BSD to Rule them All (even though they are all dying)? The Foreman iGrill? Volkswagens? Red and blue lasers? Sharks?

    • Re:Evil bit support (Score:5, Informative)

      by Build6 ( 164888 ) on Wednesday April 02, 2003 @11:21AM (#5644400)
      I guess I shoulda made this more clear in my initial submission.

      I think the primary thing that the old MacOS had that the current one doesn't, is good handling of file metadata. I think most people who come from a Windows/x86 background don't really understand how magical it is to have a file system that, for example, can allow for different files of essentially the same "file type" yet be launched by different apps (file "creator" and file "type" tags exist).

      This was discussed in Ars Technica quite a while back, as well:

      http://arstechnica.com/reviews/01q3/metadata/met ad ata-1.html

      And, this "other thing" I'm talking about is a (properly) spatial finder.

      • Re:Evil bit support (Score:5, Interesting)

        by DeadSea ( 69598 ) on Wednesday April 02, 2003 @11:45AM (#5644563) Homepage Journal
        When I first tried a Mac it frustrated me that I didn't have the type of control that I was used to on Windows. I couldn't make a certain program open a file by renaming it. The icon of a file would change when it was saved by a different program. Because I was used to working with text documents that could be opened by a variety of programs, this really confused me.

        Eventually I learned about the different meta-data types and how to edit them. If anything, I found that the Mac had several power user features too well hidden for me.

      • Re:Evil bit support (Score:3, Insightful)

        by sjonke ( 457707 )
        I think most people who come from a Windows/x86 background don't really understand how magical it is to have a file system that, for example, can allow for different files of essentially the same "file type" yet be launched by different apps (file "creator" and file "type" tags exist)

        So magical, indeed, that it would, not infrequently get corrupted and lose track of what was what and you'd end up with documents of certain types looking like generic, unknown documents that in some cases couldn't be opened
        • but you left out the most wonderful thing about using Mac OS. it worked this way in classic and does it in X with a vengence.

          the Drag and Drop. yes, drag and drop is an art in Mac OS and in X you can drag any file onto any app running or not, to launch said file. it works like a champ. grab ten jpegs and drop them onto Photoshop, boom! grab a file with no extension and a blank icon, drag onto stuffit expander and that .tgzipped doc from some solaris developer's package magically unzips.

      • Well, with KDE right now I can right click on any file and tell it to open with any application on the system.

        I guess you can do this with Win2k, too, but I prefer KDE.

        For example I wrote a script to automaticly loopback mount my cdrom isos into a .loop.pid directory and open a konqueror window. As soon as I exit the window the loopback filesystem is unmounted. Then I right click and I have an option to burn the iso onto a CD. That was another script I wrote that automaticly burns an entire directory o

        • Well, with KDE right now I can right click on any file and tell it to open with any application on the system. I guess you can do this with Win2k, too, but I prefer KDE.

          And you can do it with OS X. Ctrl-Click > Open With > Application | Other ... . If you have bought yourself a scroll mouse (like my Macally mouse) you can use the right mouse button to Ctrl-click, just like Win2K/XP.

  • I don't agree with the article (Score:5, Interesting)

    by MarkWatson ( 189759 ) on Wednesday April 02, 2003 @11:09AM (#5644313) Homepage
    It is easy to criticize. I use OS X about 80% of the time, Linux/KDE about 15%, and Windows 2000 about 5%. OS X, in my opinion, gives the best desktop experience.

    Any desktop uses a spacial metaphor for data - however, for me, the desktop is just a holding area - short term memory, if you will.

    I do like the idea of other means of filtering: LifeStreams seems like a good idea: being able to filter based on time and document type (for example).

    Anyway, it is a free world - I will stick with OS X.

    -Mark

    • Well I'm not saying I am going to "abandon OS X" (and I don't think the article writer is?) but the point is... it could be so much better, you know? (at least for me) OS X would be *perfect* if on top of the new UNIX innards there was a "classic" theme where OS X acted exactly like the old macOS. I'm not saying I'll never switch to the existing OS X/Aqua UI, but I certainly miss the old MacOS.

      yes, I dual-boot my Macs and I still use OS9. Am looking warily at the new generation of machines that won't bo

    • Re:I don't agree with the article (Score:5, Insightful)

      by feldsteins ( 313201 ) <scott@@@scottfeldstein...net> on Wednesday April 02, 2003 @11:31AM (#5644465) Homepage
      Yeah I remember lifestreams and I agree it's a fantastic idea. I'd love to see it developed further!

      I also appreciate (sincerely!) the criticisms of OS X one finds at Ars. They are consistently thorough and honest. Still, sometimes it seems like OS X is held to a far higher standard with regard to UI than other products. I mean, correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't think Linux (any flavor) or Windows (any flavor) has recieved nearly the same amount of scrutiny and criticism with regard to UI. Why is that? Is it simply because Apple brags about it so much? Is it a recognition that Apple does it best (usually) and therefore it is fair that they should be evaluated based on that claim? I suspect that this is the reason.

      I fear, however, that it gives the casual Windows or Linux-using reader the wrong impression - the impression that OS X UI stinks. It doesn't. It's a relatively new UI and needs refinement, but as I said, I believe the level of criticism leveled at it is mostly due to the recognized fact that Apple does it better than most others.

      • Re:I don't agree with the article (Score:5, Insightful)

        by IamTheRealMike ( 537420 ) on Wednesday April 02, 2003 @12:18PM (#5644799)
        Still, sometimes it seems like OS X is held to a far higher standard with regard to UI than other products. I mean, correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't think Linux (any flavor) or Windows (any flavor) has recieved nearly the same amount of scrutiny and criticism with regard to UI.

        I can't speak for Windows but Linux does for sure, in the past 12 months I must have seen more "usability reviews" of various parts of the Linux desktop than I've had hot meals. Most of them are worthless, but in general the noise over usability has had an effect, go see the effort and elbow grease being put into GNOME (especially) and KDE now for instance. The Nautilus team have been hard at work doing what is basically just polish and optimization (just as well, it really needed it!) lately for instance.

        Why is that? Is it simply because Apple brags about it so much?

        Well, when you look at the Mac value proposition, basically it boils down to their user interface. They can't sell on price or speed or number of apps, nor do they have the "nobody got fired for buying Foo" mentality on their side. Their no 1 selling point is that Macs are supposedly easier and more efficient to work with.

        As such, people talk about that, it's the one thing that makes Apple unique. Personally, although they still do better than most companies, I think their reputation for UI expertise has taken a bit of a battering with the Jobsian era - go read some reviews of MacOS X from former OS 9 users, who point out some of the more laughable usability errors in OS X. These days, I think they're trading a lot on reputation, people think "Macs are easy!" and because ease of use is so subjective, they rarely get challenged on that point. That's what makes articles like this one so fascinating.

        • I concur with just about eveything you say. I would also add that Apple's "value proposition" is a tad wider than simply "better UI." I think it's got a lot to do with the integrated experience they are always pimping. You know, like end-to-end stuff like iPhoto. Insert digicam here, get database archives, editing, prints, books, etc, out the other end. No worries about somene else's software being required, either. They sell, to use a vendors term, "solutions." Solutions to problems like "I have a di

      • Re:I don't agree with the article (Score:5, Informative)

        by SewersOfRivendell ( 646620 ) on Wednesday April 02, 2003 @05:13PM (#5647322)
        I mean, correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't think Linux (any flavor) or Windows (any flavor) has recieved nearly the same amount of scrutiny and criticism with regard to UI. Why is that? Is it simply because Apple brags about it so much? Is it a recognition that Apple does it best (usually) and therefore it is fair that they should be evaluated based on that claim? I suspect that this is the reason.

        Well, somewhat. The parent post is correct in that OS X has still by far the best UI out there. Mac OS is the benchmark by which all user interfaces are judged, and so all changes to it are held to a much higher standard.

        The reason why the author wrote this article, though, is that, compared to the Mac OS 9 Fnder, the X Finder really is a mess (better in 10.2, but a polished turd is still a turd). Compared to Windows Explorer, X Finder still wins, but that's saying very little, isn't it? Nautilus is much better than Windows Explorer, but it still has at least a couple more major revs ahead of it before it approaches Mac OS Finder-territory.

        For those who didn't bother to read the article: the author's not saying that everything from Mac OS 9 should be brought back. He's not saying that Mac OS 9 was the end-all of user interface. He's saying that the Finder, as the center of the user's OS X experience, should be a substantial advancement over OS 9, and right now it's not. It's a kludgy, poorly-integrated hybrid of NeXT and classic Mac OS. He's saying the Finder should bring the best of NeXT and classic Mac OS into a unified whole, along with a few other much-needed enhancements.

        And I think he's right. Hopefully Panther (10.3) Finder will head in the direction suggested by this article.

        For any newbies out there who might be confused: the Finder is the Mac file browser, equivalent to Windows Explorer, Midnight Commander, or Nautilus. It is not the user interface to all applications -- it is the tool you use to get to (or "find") your applications and documents.

    • Everything the author said would make life using a Mac easier, more productive and significantly more intuitive.

      Watch out, someone might be moving your cheese.
    • I think even the author would agree with you that Mac OSX offers the best desktop experience. That's why we need to criticize Mac OSX... because it's the leader. Criticizing Windows, KDE and others is easy (and pointless): "make your OS more like Mac OSX and call me when your there".
    • Me neither, find + grep, baby! None of this "spatial orientation" rubbish :)

  • OS X is in its infancy (Score:5, Informative)

    by Seanasy ( 21730 ) on Wednesday April 02, 2003 @11:14AM (#5644347)

    I love OS X. But it is such a huge change from OS 9- that I consider it a newborn new OS albeit with a very rich parents. I think what we've seen so far is just the beginning. They had to get things to work first. Refinements will be forthcoming.

    While a lot of the article is interesting -- live folders sound useful -- I'm content with the Finder. It could -- and I'm sure will -- get some tweaking but I don't find it an obstacle in my daily work.

    • i'm just happy that Apple implemented RFC 3514 [rfc-editor.org]

      its very important, and i dont understand why slashdot isnt posting it.

    • I agree 100%. I compare the development of OS X to Mozilla, after the initial production quality (10.0 and 1.0 respectively in my eyes) release, the products have just kept in getting better with astonishing speed.

    • OK, I admit I only skimmed the article. But, I've gone back and skimmed it again and now I think the author is an idiot.

      Bookmarks - A simplified version of this feature already exists in the form for "Favorites", but it seems only natural to expand this feature to match the bookmarking facilities found in web browsers.

      How is favorites different from bookmarks again?

      Back/forward buttons with history - The OS X Finder already has back and forward buttons, but they lack history pop-up menus. And

      • "Bookmarks - A simplified version of this feature already exists in the form for "Favorites", but it seems only natural to expand this feature to match the bookmarking facilities found in web browsers."

        How is favorites different from bookmarks again?

        I could be snide and say "use each feature and find out for yourself", but I'll be nice and say that Favorites are a flat list with a fixed order, whereas most web browsers allow bookmarks to be arranged into folders, ordered arbitrarily, and include n

    • You are missing the point. Classic had all these things that the author is talking about -consistency, spatiality, concreteness- from the very beginning. Those weren't properties that evolved out of a process of refinement: instead they permeated the system throughout and guided every development effort, sometimes to detrimental effect: the 2-fork file concept makes it rather difficult to transmit files for example.

      In any case, I agree with the author. Just to name an example, having to "associate" icons

  • A Better Finder (Score:4, Interesting)

    by nf0 ( 214122 ) on Wednesday April 02, 2003 @11:17AM (#5644364)
    As a long time user of Linux, new to the world of OS X. I've found the best finder , is just to drop in to a terminal or iTerm and do things the easy way. Command line is faster, to me anyway.

    • Re:A Better Finder (Score:5, Insightful)

      by peter_gzowski ( 465076 ) on Wednesday April 02, 2003 @12:01PM (#5644683) Homepage
      The command line is faster if you have a good memory. And it's easier to search for and manipulate files based on their filename/size/type from the command line (assuming you have a decent shell, and a good command of regex expressions). However, if all you want to do is go a couple directories deep and copy a group of files from that directory to another, a file browswer like Konqueror is just as fast. What I think would be great is a shell that's linked to a graphical file browser. If Konsole and Konqueror were linked, such that when I typed, "cd ~/Stuff" in Konsole, Konqueror would act like I'd clicked on "~/Stuff," then I would get the power of a terminal but the easy visualization of the graphical file browser. THAT would be killer.
      • That sort of functionality was present in "efm", the file manager for Enlightenment 0.17, before they yanked it so they could waste the past three years or so re-writing everything from scratch and putting wrapper libraries around stuff (then re-writing those wrapper libraries). (OK, so I'm bitter -- yesterday's joke opened up old wounds.)

        Anyway, it had other cool features. You could execute commands in the window as well. For instance, type "make" and it would pop up an xterm with make running in it.
    • Yes, for experienced users. The command line is deadly for anybody else though - even for people with lots of experience it's all too easy to accidentally delete files, overwrite them with junk because you're going so fast the slightest mental slip and you're dead.

      GUIs like the Finder are slower for most operations, but they give users a safety net that is usually appreciated.

  • I may sound really stupid, but.... (Score:4, Informative)

    by Captain Rotundo ( 165816 ) on Wednesday April 02, 2003 @11:29AM (#5644451) Homepage
    What the hell is a 'finder' ? I don't use Mac OSX and never used MacOS, but I constantly see people talking about the 'finder' I am very curious what is it? I use GNOME, so if you could related it to a feature of that maybe I would understand better.
    • The Finder is basically a file manager. Coming from a GNOME perspective, you could think of it as performing the same role as Nautilus, or gmc before that.
    • Think Nautilus. On windows, it's the "my computer"/explorer stuff.

    • Re:I may sound really stupid, but.... (Score:4, Informative)

      by IamTheRealMike ( 537420 ) on Wednesday April 02, 2003 @12:09PM (#5644725)
      The finder, for those who might not have used a Mac (ie quite a lot of people I should imagine), works something like this:

      Basically, it is like Explorer in Windows, or Nautilus in GNOME. It runs all the time, you cannot quit it. I think it draws the desktop. The finders default mode is column based, this is rather different to traditional file managers. Each folder "level" in the heirarchy gets a new column, starting from left to right. Clicking a folder shows a new column with the contents and a vertical scrollbar on the right. You click and scroll your way through the hard disk, rather than interacting with a tree, like in Explorer/Konqueror.

      This is quite a bit different from the one in MacOS 9. My knowledge of that OS is a little rusty these days, but I think it was traditionally what is called an "object oriented" file browser, see ROX on Linux for an example. Win95 took this approach by default (in the very first releases). In this model, each window shows one folder, clicking a folder opens a new window. There is no concept of a "file manager" as such, it's an integral part of the desktop. There is no concept of pathing - although MacOS 9 did indeed have a path separator, virtually nobody knows what it is (a : character).

      Normally OO browsers have a spring loaded folders implementation to make the large number of windows that can be generated with this approach more manageable, unfortunately this technique is patented by Apple which one reason why Nautilus hasn't moved to it, the GNOME guys have been thinking of possible ways around this patent, as well as other browsing metaphors.

      Anyway, I digress. Basically, IIRC people have several issues with the OS X Finder beyond its design, namely that it's slow (perhaps why it doesn't use lots of new windows??) and not multithreaded, so a blocking connection or blocked device will freeze it. Window resizes are also very slow, but that's more an issue with OS X in general.

      It also pretty much abandoned the OO model in favour of a navigational one, the usability merits of which are hotly debated. You can still have OO style windows of course if you want them, but I don't think that's what new users see. The first releases didn't even have spring loaded folders, pretty essential for the OO model.

      Other than that, I think the Finder is really quite a nice program, though I never used it heavily. The column system is OK, it's not fantastic or anything but gets the job done. The tree widget it uses is incredibly feeble, so it's just as well. The fact that you can drag any object into the toolbars is also a nice touch, think iconic bookmarks.

    • File manager/desktop manager, basically.

  • Meta data may be coming (Score:5, Interesting)

    by MrMickS ( 568778 ) on Wednesday April 02, 2003 @11:37AM (#5644507) Homepage Journal
    In order to support some aspects of this finder filesystem meta data must be supported in a more complete way than it is at the moment. You don't want the system to have to trawl through the tags in every MP3 file everytime it lists the folder contents (that would make it even slower :).

    The filesystems used by OS X are the same ones that have been used by OS 9 for years, with the recent addition of journalling. Apple have employed the designer of the BeOS filesysem (which is widely held up as the best example of a desktop filesystem) and is keeping everything under wraps for Panther. I would expect some developments in this area to be revealed in July.

    Once the meta data is in place, and people have moved over to the new filesystem, look for a more intelligent finder.

    • In order to support some aspects of this finder filesystem meta data must be supported in a more complete way than it is at the moment. You don't want the system to have to trawl through the tags in every MP3 file everytime it lists the folder contents (that would make it even slower :).

      System-specific metadata should be left at the filesystem level (file permissions, ownership, etc.) but file-specific metadata shouldn't be moved out of the file. Keeping one's data files as one big block of data is a

      • I don't necessarily think that putting the data in/on the file makes any sense either, we have to deal with legacy file formats which have no provision for such tampering, some of which will not work with additional data added to the end, which is the usual suggestion in these cases. If you want to add metadata to legacy files, you can either put it in that file format's proprietary comment fields and then have your metadata handler look for it in a variety of places (this is undesirable for obvious reasons

      • Re:Meta data may be coming (Score:4, Insightful)

        by curious.corn ( 167387 ) on Wednesday April 02, 2003 @12:32PM (#5644877)
        Oh, and the cached metadata should hide in a dotfile right? user:group 0000 was fine for '70 textfiles but it's excuciatingly insufficient today; that's why KDE, GNOME and the other lots have resolved to dotfiles or (I'm a unix guy sorry for any mistake) forks. The natural evolution for filesystems is to extract previews, tags, extended attributes in short and index them for fast live searches like in BeOS. Man, one reason I HATE M$ is that it crushed BeOS into oblivion without doing anything remotely close in functionality; M$ groupies you don't know what chance you passed by!
        EA are the future, they're on Solaris (as far as I know, though I've never played with one; only old DIGITAL, sigh!), FreeBSD and of course LINUX. These are pretty much staple food for every system like 16 bit sound vs PC Speaker. It's time they be put to use and I think next wave of unix Desktops will do.
        Apple is only doing what's obvious (perhaps duplicating some data but who cares if my mp3 ID3 tags are indexed by the kernel). No more mailbox maintenance code, just make a MUA from a souped up live query on the email datatype tag. Cool (BeOS was there...)
    • Apple also spec'd the file system (HFS+) to have the ability to store metadata in a btree, similar to the catalog file. This is the 'attributes file', explained in TN1150 [apple.com]. Right now, it's unused so I imagine there are plans for this.

      Having said that, there's no place in UFS for this sorta thing & I doubt Apple could get around it by 'bundling' (using folders) like they did the last time.

      Just guessing ...

  • Solution is a more flexible "finder" api (Score:3, Interesting)

    by binaryDigit ( 557647 ) on Wednesday April 02, 2003 @11:42AM (#5644537)
    Perhaps OSX can take a page from the X world and to think of the interface more as a component and less as an integral part of the OS (skin the OS if you will). It would be better than the X world currently is since the "default" Apple interface would rule since most people wouldn't bother to make any substantial changes. But for those "power" users, they can either tweak it themselves or use someone elses "video editing power user interface".

    The difference between this and what some people already offer would be on Apple's end. Trying to make a very good desktop alternative is often difficult because it becomes too much of a monumental task to become a true replacement. And if your app just sits on top of the original gui, often times there are many things you either can't do, or can do but in a kludgey way. If the powers that be at Apple sat down and thought of a way to provide hooks into the gui (as well as the most important thing, to make sure that functionality is separated from the gui), then doing these types of things could be much simpler as well as providing a viable market for alternative interfaces.

    • Perhaps OSX can take a page from the X world and to think of the interface more as a component and less as an integral part of the OS (skin the OS if you will).

      I think you're a bit confused, X has nothing to do with component embedding (or very little). Windows for instance is the master of this, has been for years, no X there. I think I understand what you're talking about though.

      If the powers that be at Apple sat down and thought of a way to provide hooks into the gui (as well as the most important

  • If Ars Technica is so concerned about usability (Score:5, Insightful)

    by T1girl ( 213375 ) on Wednesday April 02, 2003 @11:52AM (#5644629) Homepage
    ...why is this article in white print on a black background? ... There's a reason books and newspapers are printed in black print on a white background: IT'S EASIER TO READ.

    A person who can't hold a job can always make a living as a career coach.

    • Re:If Ars Technica is so concerned about usability (Score:4, Interesting)

      by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday April 02, 2003 @12:02PM (#5644684)
      It's easier to read because paper's natural state is white. Subtracting light/color gives you the text, images, whatever. A CRT's natural state is black, so you *add* light to get text, images, etc. Using white background with black text on a screen is equivalent to printing a page solid black and leaving blank spots for the text. aka - not natural. I don't care if most of the web has adopted black on white for the mainstream design - it hurts my eyes. A medium's natural state is the easiest to read.
      • Actually one usability found that black or brown text (I forget) against a light-pink background was easiest on CRTs.

        Gag me with a spoon, but it's more readable once you get your lunch wiped off it.

        All studies have found that dark text against a plain light background is easier than the opposite on CRTs with reasonable refresh rates.
      • "It's easier to read because paper's natural state is white."

        No it isn't. Paper is made out of wood. It's 'natural' color is a nasty dirty brown. We bleach the hell out of it to make it white.

        off topic:

        when I was in college, my professor was highlighting the volume of nasty chemicals used to process the things in our homes. One example was this: If you take a roll of toilet paper, soak it overnight in a jar of water, then drink the water, it'll probably kill you. Kids, don't try this at home.

        A.
    • ...why is this article in white print on a black background? ... There's a reason books and newspapers are printed in black print on a white background: IT'S EASIER TO READ.
      Amen, brother.

      Fortunately, I use Opera [opera.com], which has a nifty "remove fancy-schmancy" formatting and presents everything in an eminently readable black-on-white (or whatever you configure it to be) font.

    • I've heard just the opposite. In fact, I knew a guy who had problems reading, and the only way he could understand text at a regular level was with black text on a white background.

      The only reason black-on-white seems natural is when we started printing, it cost money to make a page full of black ink, while a white page was free.

      For web pages, it makes sense to have white text on a black background - it is easier to read, especially if you're on a CRT... at least with all that black there it's not lik

    • good point.

      and me without my mod points. oh well, guess you'll have to be satisfied with this little reply.

      I wanted to read that article. Something about the Spacial Interface. Incredibly less convincing when it's such a pain to read at all.
    • "There's a reason books and newspapers are printed in black print on a white background: THE LESS BLACK ON A PAGE, THE LESS INK REQUIRED AND THUS THE CHEAPER IT IS TO PRINT."

      Fixed your post.

    • Do what I do:

      System Preferences/Universal Access/Seeing - "Switch to Black on White"

      Then, when you need to look at a screenshot/diagram, switch back. Works for me :P

  • One thing I really agree on... (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Equuleus42 ( 723 ) on Wednesday April 02, 2003 @11:56AM (#5644652) Homepage
    OS X should handle the iPhoto Library folder (where all iPhoto JPEG images are stored) like it handles Application bundles -- instead of showing the directory structure uncut and raw, it should display the photos in an easily-navigable format. The "Live Search" feature could be useful in this regard, as OS X could have a live search folder that contains all iPhoto pictures, or possibly variations like "all photos within the last month" or "all photos within the last year". This would make it easier to peruse one's photo collection, as you wouldn't need to fire up iPhoto every time you just wanted to look at your photos. It would also make it easier to have your rotating Desktop backgrounds show your entire photo collection.

    I know that the "all photos in one folder" feature could be accomplished at the command prompt by running "find ~/Pictures/iPhoto\ Library/* -type f -print0 | xargs -0i ln -s {} destination ", but it would be nice to have it automatically done for you by the Finder.
  • One of the things the article mentions are live search folders--basically folders comprised of an pregenerated search result (for which the index is automaticly updated).

    This allows you to have different views of your existing data to separate the physical location from what you actually want.

    Microsoft Outlook 2003 includes these search folders in it now. For example, you can have a search folder for all unread items in all folders. So if you have rules that filter your incoming mail to various foldes,
  • To quote from the article:

    Even the seemingly chaotic and messy act of "drilling down" to a deeply nested file using the Spatial Finder, double-clicking one folder after another and spawning windows like crazy, can be accomplished with comparatively little conscious thought. The user finds his way using visual cues (reinforced by the coherency and stability of the Spatial Finder) rather than by rote memorization of file paths. In the same way that you might drive a familiar route without knowing all the str
  • Too many files: Apple's Finder chokes on multiple thousands of files. If I want to put/copy/paste that many files in a folder, I damn well should be able to without the system grinding to a halt or finder crashing. I had to use 'Path Finder' ( a finder replacement, ala Windows Explorer) to handle this situation.

    Renaming files: There is a delay in renaming that makes me crazy. I'll click on a file and it won't go into the rename unless I wait a moment and click again.
    There is no undo for renaming. If I accidentally rename a file, I have to find the file (not easy with numbered files), find out what the original name was (could take a few minutes to never) and manually rename it. I want 'apple-z' to undo the rename. (It works for copy, paste and other finder operations.)
    There is a delay in the update of windows after a file has been renamed and/or saved. This also shifts the files viewable up or down so that when I go to click on the next one, I click on the file that has somehow magically appeared under my cursor. Most annoying.

    Copy/replace dialogs: There is information missing from these, that I could use to make my decision of whether or not to replace that file/s. Where is the date? It just gives me 'newer'.

    Collumn view: No viewing by date, size, or anything but name. It's there in the other 'views', why can't I have it here?

    Save Dialogs: Same with collumn view. I hated how the old os9 save dialog (think pagemaker - grr.) would pop up and be immovable - invaribly, I needed some info that was immediately under that window. Let me move it. Let me sort the contents by date, size, name.

    Labels: If you haven't used labels, you have no idea what you missed out on. Putting a colored cast to an icon was about the most useful thing I had ever seen. I used it extensively in the short time before I moved to OS X. Now the labels are gone, still visible in some os9 apps, but unused by OS X. Nothing would allow me to find a folder in a sea of blue like one with a red sheen to it.

    In fact, icons were easier to maipulate in os9 than X. It seemed I could take anything and make an icon out of it, whereas X requires more forethought and a concerted effort. This may be different now; I've stopped trying.

    Pop-up folders were swell, however I don't miss them like the labels.

    Lastly, Unresponsiveness and Instabillity: The Finder likes to sit for a moment and think about how it's going to perform the operation you told it to do. Copy the file, already. You've done it a million times, and you're wondering how this one is different? (pardon my anthromorphising). Recently, I had to ftp several thousand jpgs, and had to do it at home on my windows machine, since the finder choked at the prospect. "You want me to do what? Uh. I'm busy that weekend..."

    Mac users should know that my widows machine said nothing, but did the requested operation with no flair at all, of course.

    Apple *should* incorporate some of these features (LABELS!); they have years of a great user interface to build on. They have already impressed the hell out of me with OS X, it just needs some polishing.

    Please add your thoughts.

    • Here's another one.

      Why the hell is it easier to rename a file or folder than to run/open it?

      Pressing Enter, which in win32 or linux land would in some way activate an item, in instead delegated to the mundane activity of renaming on OS X. Do people really rename so frequently that they need to steal the Enter key for this purpose.

      To actually open you have to use Apple+O, which is considerably harder to key.

      Justin Dubs

    • Re:OS X Finder Laundry List - Please add yours. (Score:4, Informative)

      by Chmarr ( 18662 ) on Wednesday April 02, 2003 @12:36PM (#5644895)
      Too many files: Apple's Finder chokes on multiple thousands of files.

      Does not. I have one directory with some 3000 directories in it, each with from 1-500 files inside, and I can open them up and do tonnes of stuff with them. Yes, it starts to slow down, but no more than my Windows box does on the same directory.

      Renaming files: There is a delay in renaming that makes me crazy. I'll click on a file and it won't go into the rename unless I wait a moment and click again.

      Does not. Here, I'll test. Click and keep the mouse pointer over the file name. After 2 seconds it goes into rename mode, no further click required. (Yes, the delay is still required)

      There is no undo for renaming.
      Just renamed a file, and hit command-Z, and it undooed the rename just fine.

      Collumn view: No viewing by date, size, or anything but name. It's there in the other 'views', why can't I have it here?

      Click on the detail view (The icon with the number of horizonal lines), and then click on the column title that you want to sort by. How hard is this?

      Save Dialogs: Same with collumn view. I hated how the old os9 save dialog (think pagemaker - grr.) would pop up and be immovable - invaribly, I needed some info that was immediately under that window. Let me move it. Let me sort the contents by date, size, name.

      Granted the save dialog doesn't have the same viewing options as a finder window, but it's certainly movable.

      Pop-up folders were swell, however I don't miss them like the labels.

      Older versions of OS/X were missing this feature, but 'spring-loaded folders' are back.

  • os x (Score:2, Redundant)

    by jest3r ( 458429 )
    I recently sold my Windows / Gentoo dualboot machine and purchased a 12" Powerbook. All in all I am really happy with OS X - especially the application support ... however ...

    The OS X Finder could definately use some work.

    1. It doesnt seem like you can alter the individual column width in column view (which you are forced to use in certain Apple apps *cough* iTunes *cough*). As you go deeper into the tree the columns are not wide enough to read long filenames.

    2. In an icon folder view when you decreas

    • Sort by kind and the folders are listed at the top. I prefer the folders to be listed alphabetically with all of my other files, though.
      • I want to sort alphabetically with folders on top :-)

        I guess years of M$ conditioning will do this to you .. however Nautilus offers this type of view.
        • After years of MS conditioning, I still prefer my folders mixed. Of course, I probably use the keyboard in the Finder more than I use the mouse. (You can't do that in Explorer). I just start typing the name of the folder or file I want to get to and use Command+o to open the folder or file.

          Command+Up goes up in the folder hierarchy.
          Command+Left goes to the previous higher folder.
          Command+Right goes to the previous lower folder.
          I don't remember what Command+Down does.
          Command+n opens a new window.
          Shift+Comman
    • 1. It doesnt seem like you can alter the individual column width in column view
      option-click on the grabby bit in a column to resize just that column.

      3. If you view a folder in 'list' mode you cannot set the list to display folders first
      sort by 'kind' - folders might not be first, but they'll be together.

      4. If want folder shortcuts on the Dock they all look the same
      agree, but that's what custom icons are for

      5. When you drag an item off the Dock it dissapears into a puff of smoke when it should rea
  • Its going to take time for these features to be included.

    Only advice I can give is to leave feedback for Apple (positive ones!) on what you miss.

    StarTux
  • The original Finder was simply a tremendous piece of work. Indeed, if you were to compare the performance of the first Finder that supported HFS (System 6?) with that of OS X today, you'd be stunned to see just how badly today's Finder sucks.

    I swear, even on a 8MHz 68000 Mac the original Finder offered crisp, clean performance, all while supporting the creator/filetype convention that made working with Mac files so easy and intuitive.

    Contrast that with today's Finder, that is barely able to even work hal

  • disguised as serious UI theory. Look, the moment the guy writes:

    Labels - Like the feature introduced in System 7, but extensible, and with support for different scopes (e.g. globally visible labels, user-specific labels, etc.) The ability to "colorize" icons is a natural extension of the Spatial Finder, providing a quick visual cue for metadata that would otherwise have to be read as a text.

    he loses credibility. Not because labels are a bad thing, they're a good thing, and I'd like to have them too, a

  • Oh, wonderful... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Millennium ( 2451 ) on Wednesday April 02, 2003 @12:19PM (#5644802)
    Another victim of interface fundamentalism. A few decent points, but for the most part the guy sounds like he just wants his OS9 back. Rather disappointing; his articles are usually much more... hmm, how to put it... independent than this.

    Look. Spatial orientation is a good paradigm. It is not, however, the be-all and end-all of interface design. This appears to be something that Tog and his apostles have yet to understand. There is a better way. I don't claim to know what it is; it's possible that it might not have even been discovered yet. But there's always a better way, and rather than slavishly imitating older designs we should be working to find newer ones.

    The whole interesting thing about NeXT is that they managed to create a non-spatial interface paradigm that actually worked well. For all the theory behind spatial orientation being so much faster, it just doesn't hold up in the real world. In the end, they're basically equal, with each paradigm having its own advantages and disadvantages, but it all comes out in the wash. That's the interesting thing about the human mind: theory is good, but reality often breaks the rules. Would it be nice if the Finder actually remembered window positions and icons in a consistent manner? Yes, it would; it's rather convenient. I wouldn't mind seeing this fixed in OSX's finder, if it can be done in a manner that doesn't cripple its speed. But that's all it is: a convenience; there's nothing to show that it actually precipitates a fundamental, universal improvement in performance or usability.

    Labels: Worse than useless, at least in the incarnation we know from OS9. Better systems can be devised, as the myriad workflow tools in existence have shown us.

    Recordability: OK, touche on this one. I don't use AppleScript much myself, but recordability is a Very Good Thing in terms of convenience.

    The "Finder Browser": I oppose the name pretty strongly, if only because it would likely spread the meme-virus common to Windows and the Linux desktop environments that the file manager and Web browser should be intertwined in the same app. Other than that, what I'd like to see, if Column View is taken out of the Finder, is an option to use it in place of the Finder, not just as a complement. It's a different paradigm, but for many people it's better, and so it should be able to replace the old.

    Live Searches: Interesting, but I don't think these should be part of the Finder, per se. Don't make them folders; make them documents. Siracusa was wondering how to make them visually distinct from folders, and this would be the best way. Double-click, and it opens a new window, visually distinct from the Finder windows (and thus providing another contextual clue). The results are then displayed in a list format; since this is "non-spatial" there's no advantage to icon view and plenty of disadvantages, such as wasted screen space. In the space it takes to display twelve items arranged in a square for icon view, you could display 25 items or more in a list. That ability to see more items at once easily supercedes the advantage to icon-esque views, given the purpose of such searches.

    Finder Plugins: These actually exist in OSX. They're very poorly documented, and almost no one knows about them; the only one I've ever seen was for viewing AppleWorks word-processing documents in the Finder.

    Metadata: Hellz yeah. Metadata is a Great Thing, and needs to be used more extensively in OSX, not less.

    OSX's lack of support for metadata: Um, OSX does support metadata. The problem is, as is the case with most of Apple's best stuff, there's no documentation on it, leaving developers out in the cold.

    As a final note: with a Unix system, it isn't possible to achieve the one-to-one relationships between icons and files seen in OS9 and such. You can do it with windows and folders, which seems to be Siracusa's main beef, but it's impossible with icons and files, which may be equally impor

    • Re:Oh, wonderful... (Score:3, Interesting)

      by ivan256 ( 17499 )
      Another victim of interface fundamentalism. ... Spatial orientation is a good paradigm. It is not, however, the be-all and end-all of interface design.

      I think the article's flaw is on a different level. It's not that he wants spacial representation, but that he wants a specific spacial representation that he happens to be familliar with. He says "there must be a one to one relationship between folders and windows." This is not the only way to create a coherent spacial relationship, it's just the one he's

    • Re:Oh, wonderful... (Score:3, Interesting)

      by Phroggy ( 441 )
      The whole interesting thing about NeXT is that they managed to create a non-spatial interface paradigm that actually worked well.

      As was pointed out in the article, people who are used to remembering file paths can handle non-spacial interfaces better than newbies. If you're trying to access a file buried four layers deep, the column view works fine if you can remember the path, but spacial orientation allows you to use OTHER clues (such as which corner of the window you left it in) to choose the correct
  • Has anyone else seen absolutely abysmal network performance with the finder?

    We have several folders on our main webserver that contain several thousand files and folders, and OS X always craps out trying to browse through it. This doesn't happen with local files.

    This includes some save dialogs, such as Photoshop's, making OS X very difficult to use on our network. We resorted to making symlinks, based on the first letter of the directory names, into separate folders. eg. `folder2/b' would contain sym

  • Low end/high end divide (Score:4, Informative)

    by IamTheRealMike ( 537420 ) on Wednesday April 02, 2003 @12:47PM (#5644955)
    It's an interesting article, although most of the points related to OO (spatial) vs navigational browsing have already been hashed out on the Nautilus list, which I read sometimes - I think if you want a view of both sides of the argument, that might be a good place to go now, especially as the issue isn't as clear cut as this article makes it out to be.

    In particular, the navigational model has a few things going for it. Firstly, people have already been forced into it by the spread of the web. One of the most, if not THE most popular apps in usage today is the web browser. The web is clearly a navigational model, the browser is a viewport onto a small segment of the whole, with links between them. Clicking a link does not open a new window, and there is no enforced relationship between the website and the window. The concept of the "path" is forced onto the user via URLs, and the current path is constantly shown in a prominant place.

    In the OO model of course, you are only allowed to have one window showing a folder at any point - opening it from somewhere else simply raises the window to the top.

    Nonetheless, I have yet to find people who consider web browsers to be seriously confusing. The "spatial" model ties in with the physical world, but we deal just as much with the navigational model in the the real world as well, think TV/radio channels for instance.

    I think he also misses the fact that mental modelling is not an absolute - it can and must fit in with other considerations. The OO model may well be more spatial and perhaps more natural, but it has other problems as well, like the fact that you can easily end up with many small windows open at once. In the absence of any equivalent to the taskbar, such a thing always irritated me in MacOS 9. When you do have a taskbar of course, OO browsing simply fills it up very quickly making it useless.

    Not even virtual desktops can solve that problem. Virtual desktops of course have questionable usability in the first place, but in fact I've NEVER met anybody who disliked them, not even really green newbies. Virtual desktops make OO browsing even harder, because you can only have 1 window open at once for any given folder, if you open one, windows start jumping around from different desktops (unless you want to lock them together or place the window on multiple desktops at once - yuck!).

    As an example of where breaking reality might be faster than sticking religiously to an OO model, imagine for a moment you have X-Men style super powers. You want to retrieve a piece of paper, that is in a box, in drawer, in a cupboard. Which is faster, opening the cupboard, pulling out the drawer, taking out and opening the box, getting the piece of paper and then putting it all away again, or using X-Ray vision to find the paper with the power of your mind, then kinetically pull it through the walls of the cupboard to sit in front of you?

    A poor analogy, I'll admit, but what usability reviews often miss is that in return for some breakage of the mental model, you can get large increases in efficiency. Virtual desktops might well be unnatural, but once you get used to them you don't want to go back, no matter what your skill level is - perhaps people who'd never seen them before would get confused, but for everybody else the usability is enhanced, not decreased.

    I guess I should qualify that this doesn't mean I'm in the "lots of crack preferences" camp a la Mosfet and the gang, I mean each feature should be weighed carefully for its cost in usability loss to newbies vs the increase in usability once you have understood the system.

  • This is a very long-winded article with many rants, and little substance.

    In essence:

    1. Macs rule
    2. OS X sucks
    3. OS 9 is the shiznit

    The author describes what he/she wants. Which is fine. But a little organization on the users part goes a long way towards making things easier. UNIX is very particular in how it wants things placed. There is good reason for this; it makes things run faster and more reliably. Mac people understand this when talking about a visual interface (continuity) yet are absolut
  • would be the Tracker from BeOS.

    Well, maybe not in overall UI terms, but in terms of file management, it rocks. it's really nice to be able to search my hard drives for all mp3's from 1980-1989 excluding any from the Genre hair metal.

    of course, that has more to do with the underlying filesystem than with the trakcer itself. hopefully finder will be able to do those kinds of filesystem acrobatics when dominic giampaolo is done hacking on hfs+.

  • Where OS X "Finding" really falls down... (Score:3, Insightful)

    by frenchgates ( 531731 ) on Wednesday April 02, 2003 @01:22PM (#5645263)
    The Open/Save dialogs.

    Under Win2K I can do the following in the open/save dialogs:

    * Customize my view style (icon, list, etc)
    * Filter visible files by my own criteria
    * Directly manipulate (move, rename, delete, etc)
    * Right click to do things like compress the file before choosing it
    * Sort by other than name
    * type first letter to jump to file
    * quickly see where in the hierarchy I am all at once

    These are not trivial features but they would be trivial for Apple to implement.

    Too confusing for the neophyte? Give us an expert mode, please.

  • Spatial Finder, etc. (Score:5, Interesting)

    by thatguywhoiam ( 524290 ) on Wednesday April 02, 2003 @01:42PM (#5645439)
    The article is pretty good at explaining the idea of a Spatial Finder, but I think that a lot of people give this idea too much credit.

    My impression is that, when Mr. Siracusa speaks of spatial orientation, many times he is actually referring to basic consistency.

    First points: labels and pop-up windows are a bit of a moot point, as they are coming in Panther. (Yes, I've seen builds.) So don't sweat it.

    Spatial qualities are useful; however they are just that, qualities. The original Finder was very much in the vein the author describes; a window was a folder which contained icons that were your files. The current iteration of OS X, I might point out, pretty much sticks to this as long as you have the toolbar collapsed (that underused widget in the right side of the toolbar). Collapsing this toolbar will give you something very very similar to what we had before. Furthermore OS X takes it even futher with the use of packages - I'm surprised he didn't mention this - which allows whole applications to keep their guts in one place. Therefore the icon is the application now, as well. I could see Apple taking this further: imagine being able to install a Photoshop plug-in by just dragging it onto the single Photoshop icon.

    Now, as far as spatially oriented interfaces being insufficient for the task of managing many thousands of files... there is something to that. The old Finder would have absolutely choked on certain computing situations common now (giant nested MP3/photo folders, for instance). It just doesn't scale to that many files cleanly.

    Having said that, it shouldn't have to. A user generally has far fewer abstractions they are mentally adhering to than what is presented in your interface. I think this is where half-baked implementations like favourites really fall down. Favourites is a great idea. When you save something, or move something, you are generally thinking about the project you are working on. Odds are you have one master folder for this project, with several sub-folders divided the way you like. The data contained within these folders takes various forms (text, code, media). Depending on what kind of work you are doing, one 'view' that is entirely appropriate for say, code, is not appropriate for graphics previewing. You want to work in the view that is appropriate, and have it 'stick'. You don't want to drill through 'My Computer -> My Documents -> My Whatever' to get to it, if possible. This mixing of standard OS bits and pieces with your actual 'work' files is what causes people to lose their work in some loopy abstraction. While the idea of just having a filename field and a pull-down for a Save dialog is great, people just don't take the time to define Favourites as they are quite used to simply creating folders when they need them, and then navigating each time to that folder. OS X could do a better job by remembering which folder you last saved to, no matter what. I hate it when Flash constantly thinks I want to save Flash projects in the Flash application directory. If you could tell the OS, when you create a folder, that is is a project folder, and have it automatically add it to your Favourites (I like 'Projects', can you tell?), that would be spiffy.

    So Mr. Siracuse's idea of Finder plug-ins is sound. I might just add that you only really need one plug-in, QuickTime, which can handle damn near anything you throw at it. What QuickTime can't catch, Quartz sure can (i.e. previews of PDFs and other vector artwork). The idea that the Finder should be an end-all to every kind of work is somewhat mad. The author's ideas about metadata are great, and I also think Apple is working on this (that Be guy they hired). I'm not sure about abstracting the Finder to a true 'browser' even more, I can't make up my mind on that. What I don't want to see is a schizo metaphor like Windows, where you have two distinct ways of browsing and no preference given to either (i.e. re

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