Posts Tagged ‘Finder’

Making Finder’s Toolbar work for you

Sunday, January 21st, 2007

FinderRubin emails to ask:

I was reading your new post on Address Book syncing and backup, and I noticed on the screen capture that you had a little Yojimbo icon on your Finder windows. I’m a Yojimbo user and a big fan too. How did you get this little icon and what does it do?

Fair question.

While the Finder Toolbar can be expanded with many useful pre-defined extras (Control-Click on Finder’s Toolbar and select “Customize Toolbar…”), you can also add your own favourite items:

Findertoolbar

I dragged some of the apps that I use a lot (TextMate, Terminal, Yojimbo) from the Applications folder onto the Toolbar. That creates a shortcut on the Toolbar. Now I can quickly launch the apps by clicking on these icons and, more importantly, I can drag files onto the icons to open them.

I’ve also added on the right some of the folders into which I often need to file things. When tidying up, I drag the files onto those folders and they’re filed.

Of course, there are other ways to do these things, not least Quicksilver, but another option is always welcome.

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Folder Action applescript for archiving files on Gmail

Tuesday, January 16th, 2007

GmailfolderactionMurphy at Murphy Mac has created a few screencasts that walk viewers through the process of using an applescript Folder Action to email files quickly and painlessly to a predetermined email address.

He suggests that it could be used to configure a folder that shoots off any file dragged into it to someone you frequently send files to.

Another option is to configure a Folder Action so that any file dragged onto a particular folder is automatically send to your Gmail address for archiving.

Other possibilities are not hard to imagine — emailing photos to your Backpack account or whatever.

One screencast shows the Folder Action at work , as Murphy emails some iPhone graphics (very topical) to his Gmail account.

After the Folder Action is set up, all you have to do is drag the file over the enabled folder:

Folderaction Drag

Enter a subject line when prompted, and whoosh!–Mail.app sends off the file–which arrives at Gmail, ready for archiving and storage:

Folderaction Arrived

A second screencast describes how to edit the applescript he provides so that this will work for you:

Folderaction Editingscript

It’s a clever solution for people who are always emailing attachments to particular people or who are looking for a simple way to archive files online.

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Mail Type Select 2.6: Finder-like text matching in Mail.app, now universal

Monday, September 11th, 2006

MailtypeselectKen Ferry’s Mail Type Select plugin for Mail.app adds “Finder-like” text matching to the message list window.

That is to say, when the plugin is installed, you can click in the message list window and start typing. Mail will match on the first occurrence of what you type just as finder does (you can jump to additional matches using the Control+down arrow or up arrow keys). It’s quick. After you have used it for a while, it could become second nature. Nice.

It’s now a universal binary, so Intel Mac users can benefit from the speedy matching too.

Mail Type Select is freeware. It’s available from Ken Ferry’s web site .

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Finder’s Keepers

Tuesday, January 31st, 2006

icon_macosx12022003John Siracusa of Ars Technica has written a long and interesting post on Leopard and the future of Finder.

It’s worth reading.

He suggests:

Dissatisfaction with the Mac OS X Finder is endemic in the Mac user community, ranging from mild frustration to deep-seated rage.

Apple recently advertised for a software engineer to join the development team for Finder.

John, who is always interested in Finder, takes this as a sign of things to come and ponders what Finder’s keepers have in store for the future.

Along the way he touches on the history of Finder, muses on Leopard (10.5) and even Ocelot (10.6).

Recent switchers like me, who know of nothing before Panther, will find lots to learn. Old hands will no doubt find much to prompt their memories and provoke them.

[Thanks, Dan !]

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