"Go To" Hell

andychrist

andychrist

devil's plaything
For some time now, on my well maintained iForced BondiMac running X.3.3, whenever I try to access any of my files by way of the "Go to Folder..." command of the Go menu, I immediately get "The folder cannot be found." On a perhaps related note, AppleWorks 6.2.9 has never been able to automatically update Open Recent from the File menu, although "Starting Points" seems to accurately record most recently saved documents.

Any possible solutions to these Finder woes?

ThanX in advance gang.
 
Hey, I've just realised that doesnt work for me either, and there is nothing "iForced" about my AGP Graphics G4. I use "Go" all the time, and "connect to server" but yep, now that you mention it, "Go to folder" doesnt work at all, can't find any of the simply named folders on my desktop.
 
Here's what's going on. The path (unless you're logged in as root) starts with ~.

The cool thing is that you can type "~/Do" then press the "tab" button on your keyboard and it will fill in the rest "~/Documents/"
 
Ah, I see what you problem is. You're not using a legal path, it has to be a proper path from the location you are in to the location you want to go to. ie, if you are in your home folder and type "System" nothing will happen, you need to type "/System".
 
This is a better explanation (and more accurate)!

dlloyd said:
Ah, I see what you problem is. You're not using a legal path, it has to be a proper path from the location you are in to the location you want to go to. ie, if you are in your home folder and type "System" nothing will happen, you need to type "/System".
Click to expand...
 
Thanks for the compliment :D

Basically:

'/[path]' starts you from the 'virtual root'; the top of the directory structure. It's a little confusing because from the 'top' you can go to either a volume (/CD ROM) or a folder in the startup disc (/Applications).

'~[path]' starts you from your Home folder.

These are standard path addresses, you can use them in FTP, the shell, and almost anywhere else. One other command that doesn't seem to be supported in the Go to Folder window is '../' to take you up a level.
 
Okay, that works.

Of course, if I could always remember the right paths to all the files that I've squirreled away, then it would be a lot easier just to navigate to them using hierarchical menus than to type in the whole sequence.

No wonder this is not a popular Menu Command!

ThanX kids.
 
dlloyd said:
One other command that doesn't seem to be supported in the Go to Folder window is '../' to take you up a level.
Click to expand...

Well, that makes perfect sense, because in order for you to "go up a level", you have to actually be somewhere first. "Go to Folder" isn't an actual location, so you can't "go up a level" from that dialog.

"Go to Folder" isn't like being in a Terminal shell -- in a Terminal shell, you're always somewhere: in a folder, at the root directory, in a home directory, etc... so, "../" takes you up a level. "Go to Folder" is more like telling the Finder to open one single location, starting from nowhere.

For example, if you're currently viewing your home folder in the Finder, then select "Go to Folder", "../" will do nothing -- because your home folder window and the "Go to Folder" commands aren't linked at all.
 
Well, technically they are. If you do a Go to Folder while you have a window open, the dialog comes out as a sheet. If you don't have a location opened, it's just a normal window. I think it would make sense to have '../' off while you don't have a location open, but turn it on if you do.
 
Ah, yes, I can see how it could be misleading in that case. Perhaps "Go to Folder" only accepts absolute paths instead of relative paths, although it does work with "~".

Perhaps it's because "../" is simply an abbreviation for "cd ../" and therefore isn't really a valid path, so to speak.
 
Aahh yeeeeaaahhh.... thats working for me too now, thanks. didnt realise it was command-line format, which should have been obvious really....
 
What were you trying to use with it? If you were just typing a folder name and hoping it would go there... (well, you'd end up with a problem: which folder of that name to go to?) :)
 
Anybody else stick their hard drive in the Dock and right-click navigate it like I do?
 
I use FruitMenu and can right click regardless of what program I'm in, and see all my drives, with sub menus.
 
Arden said:
Anybody else stick their hard drive in the Dock and right-click navigate it like I do?
Click to expand...

Yep, I do! All four of them! Makes my desktop SO much neater. Plus, I've got a folder down there with the hard drives with frequently used applications (kind of like an Apple Menu of sorts, organized into subfolders like "Applications," "Multimedia," "Utilities," etc...).
 
I do too Arden!
I have the Harddrive, Application's folder, Home folder, and Sites folder, though I don't use that last much.
 
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