Windows Power-User makes the Big Switch (questions enclosed)

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Willxiv

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I'm satisfied with my move to buy a Mac. I'm an avid power-user who's operating at about 70% speed when making a comparison between my skill with the Windows applications I use and their OSX counterparts. Below I list several Leopard issues that are annoying me, with hopes that either my questions can be answered or that I can find a support group with which to grumble.

1 - When 1 of more items are selected, why does the small bar at the bottom of Finder's window display the available storage left on my disk (which can't possibly be considered useful) instead of displaying the total size of said selected items?

2 - While changing the View Options for Finder sidebar items (the bar at the top of the editing window actually displays the name of the specific sidebar item you are toying with), why does clicking Use as Defaults change the settings on some of the other sidebar items? There doesn't even seem to be a logical way of figuring out why or how the operating system decides which ones get changed all together when this button is clicked. It would be much more useful to have each sidebar selection carrying its own default preferences (and saving the window size/dimensions of each would be nice, too).

3 - When switcing the view of Finder (such as switcing from Thumbnails to List), why do the navigation steps I've already taken get erased - sending me back to the root folder of the selected sidebar item?

4 - In Finder, why is there no way to clear (either some or all) the items displayed in the "Search For Today/Yesterday/Past Week" selections?

5- How can I get the home and end buttons on the keyboard to actually behave like home and end buttons (in relation to text input) of Windows?

There's a few more, but I can't quite remember - amid my Friday night drunkenness - what they might be. All my other questions are application-specific, and I'm taking those issues to their proper forums.

Thanks in advance for your replies.

-Will
 
I don't have an answer to all your questions.

1. Because most people want to see how much space is left, if you click the view option with 4 lines on it, it will show how big the files are.

3. I havent had that problem, when I switch it stays in the same folder I was viewing.

4. You can either drag them off, click the arrow next to "search for" or you can click on finder, then click "Finder" in the menu bar and go to preferences in the drop down menu, and then click the tab "Sidebar" then below it will give you options to edit the sidebar and you can uncheck the search for stuff.
 
Welcome to the Mac! One tip: if you hold down the Command key (the key with the cloverleaf on it) and then click the title of the window, you'll be presented with a hierarchical path back to where you started in your navigation. This works on everything from Tiger on down to versions of the Mac OS before OS X.

Leopard goes one step further and gives you the "breadcrumb" path within the Finder window itself.
 
Thanks for your replies, gentlemen.

icemanjc:
Do most people really need to be reminded about how much memory they have left on their hard disk? I can imagine if it's a small disk in a macbook - but in a 300+ GB disk, it seems a little silly to have Finder telling me I have 180GB of memory left instead of the total size of my selected files. I can see, of course, how large each individual file is easily in List view, but how about a simple thing like selecting 20 files to move to an almost-full thumbdrive and wanting to know the total size before moving it?

nixgeek:
The breadcrumb path is a great idea, but what I'm talking about is different. If I'm in List view and navigate throught several folders to find 30 pictures I'm editting, changing the view to Thumbnails or Quicklook brings me all the way back to the original folder I began with. If others are not having this trouble, it would be great if someone knew how to fix this as I suppose it's possible I messed it up somehow.

Thanks again.

-Will
 
For seeing how much certain files are all together, you can select the files, then go to "File" in the menubar and select "Get Info" or you can just press Apple-I.
 
5. If you are using a laptop, try holding the fn key when you press home or end. That will take you to the beginning or end of a document. You have to remember to place the cursor there, though, because that does not move when you do that.
 
Willxiv said:
1 - When 1 of more items are selected, why does the small bar at the bottom of Finder's window display the available storage left on my disk (which can't possibly be considered useful) instead of displaying the total size of said selected items?
Click to expand...
Why? Well, not knowing the inner workings of the designer who decided that, I don't know. :p I do know that you can get the size of a collection of items by opening the Inspector. To open it, hold down the Option key and select "Show Inspector" from the File menu. You can also get it from the "Summary" window, which you can get by holding down Control and going to the File menu.

There are three kinds of file info windows in the Finder. The plain Get Info window, which shows stats on one item, the Summary window, which shows stats on a group of items, and the Inspector, which is just like the summary only it floats on top and automatically changes its contents to reflect selected files as you move around.

2 - While changing the View Options for Finder sidebar items (the bar at the top of the editing window actually displays the name of the specific sidebar item you are toying with), why does clicking Use as Defaults change the settings on some of the other sidebar items?
Click to expand...
"Use as defaults" sets the default for all folders with that view that do not have their own specific settings (i.e., using the defaults), not just for that folder. If you want to change only that folder, check the "Always open in ____ view" box. Just changing the settings and doing nothing else (neither clicking Use as Defaults or Always Open in ____ View) will set the settings for that folder only, BUT it might open in icon, list or column view next time, depending on what you've been doing. It's a little quirky.

Personally I never use the sidebar window mode because I just don't like it.

3 - When switcing the view of Finder (such as switcing from Thumbnails to List), why do the navigation steps I've already taken get erased - sending me back to the root folder of the selected sidebar item?
Click to expand...
I have never seen this problem. What navigation steps are you taking? If you're only expanding the little triangles, then this is expected behavior, because that does not change the root directory of the window. (The window will effectively be showing the contents of MANY directories, so obviously it needs to pick one to use when you switch to another view.) You may want to double-click the folders instead to make them the new root.

Or do I misunderstand the problem?

4 - In Finder, why is there no way to clear (either some or all) the items displayed in the "Search For Today/Yesterday/Past Week" selections?
Click to expand...

Go to Finder menu > Preferences > Sidebar.

5- How can I get the home and end buttons on the keyboard to actually behave like home and end buttons (in relation to text input) of Windows?
Click to expand...
I don't know how they behave in Windows, so can you elaborate on what you want?
 
Mikuro:

Thanks for the response.

You helped me learn that pressing option-command-i while multiple files are selected in Finder will bring up the summary window. This answers that issue.

You gave me a few more things to think about when it comes to Set as Default, so I'm sure a little more toying around with these thoughts in mind will help me figure it all out.

The last thing - the home and end button: in Windows (during text input/editting), the home button moves the cursor to the very beginning (left) of the line on which the cursor is residing. The end button, as you might have figured out after reading the last sentence, moves the cursor to the end (right) of the line on which the cursor is residing. I use the home and end buttons all the time during coding, so this particular nuisance bothers me more than it should.

Out of curiosity, what file-management application do you use instead of Finder, if any?
 
Mikuro:

One more thing - about clearing the lists in the Search For Today/Yesterday/Etc.: I don't want to remove them from the sidebar - I just want to clear the list once in a while. I work with a huge number of files (and folders), so having the ability to clear Today's files at a certain point of the night would be extremely helpful.

I'm going to look around for other file-management apps, as I'm starting to think Finder isn't gonna cut it.
 
Ah. I don't know off the top of my head how to rework the Home and End keys to do that, but I imagine you could. There are a bunch of standard shortcuts for navigating text, though:

Option-up/down: move insertion point to beginning/end of line
Option-left/right: move insertion point on word to the left/right
Holding down shift with either of the above will extend the selection to that point.

I use the Finder myself, i just don't use the sidebar mode. There are two modes for Finder windows, and you can toggle between them by clicking that little bottom in the top-right of the window. I suspect you'll feel more comfortable WITH the sidebar, though, since it's closer to Windows.

I see what you mean about the sidebar, now. You could rig up your own Smart Folder for the task, I suppose, but you'd have to edit the date in it to 'clear' it.
 
jbarley:
Thanks for the links - I'll check them out.

Mikuro:
I'll check into the keyboard shortcuts you've listed. Thankfully most of the applications I work with on the Mac now have the home and end buttons set the way I'd like them to work by default; there's just a few - such as TextEdit, which is a quick, small application for keeping temporary code patches (Notepad being the Windows equivalent) - in which I wish these buttons operated like the rest.

I'm polishing an Automator 2 workflow/application that has the promise to maintain a folder to keep track of daily (a smart folder to replace Finder's Search For Today) files in the manner I require. It's a little longer than I'd like it to be, but it's easier than writing a script. Thanks for the idea.
 
Oh - and an example of what I'm talking about in issue #3 is when switching from List to Column view in Finder, the arrows close completely, eliminating any navigation I might have done.
 
Power user huh?:cool: So you do know about these web sites?:

1. "Well Known" TCP and UDP ports used by Apple software products

2. QuickLook Plugins and/or QLPlugins for QuickLook

3. MacOSXHints (there database is HUGE because they have been going since OS X came out)

4. Accelerate Your Macintosh (great hardware hacking sight, especially their drive lasso reader reports)

5. Running the Mac OS X maintenance scripts

6. MacFixIt - (read the reports with a grain of salt)

7. Version Tracker and/or MacUpdate

8. MacWindows (if you do ANYTHING with intergrading a Mac in a Windows world this should be your first stop)

9. MacPicks (a listing of almost all Mac related web sites-pay attention to the page #'s at the bottom of the page)

10. BareFeats (if it a Macintosh or something that plugs into a Macintosh this web site has speed tested it)

Lastly have you ever considered a book like Mac OS X Leopard: The Missing Manual? It is better then you think and it will give any new Mac user a great edge.

If you give it a little time you can really get into the BSD guts of OS X and really do so power using. Good Luck!

*On a side note if you do ANY networking that a good look at Oreilly Press for your geek books.
 
Willxiv said:
nixgeek:
The breadcrumb path is a great idea, but what I'm talking about is different. If I'm in List view and navigate throught several folders to find 30 pictures I'm editting, changing the view to Thumbnails or Quicklook brings me all the way back to the original folder I began with. If others are not having this trouble, it would be great if someone knew how to fix this as I suppose it's possible I messed it up somehow.

Thanks again.

-Will
Click to expand...

Oh no, I understood that. I was just giving an additional tip that you might find helpful if you're using Tiger or below. It's probably not necessary in Leopard because of the breadcrumbs path, but I guess if you're viewing files in spatial mode (where each icon opens up a new window) it would still work.

Can't say that I've seen Finder do what you're describing, but I might not have noticed it. Gonna have to see for myself.
 
Pressing Apple+Home and Apple+End will make the Home and End keys act like you expect. On the Mac, pressing just Home or End takes you to the top of the page, and the bottom of the page. (The keys were designed that way for reading, not editing.)
 
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