Finder Question - Viewing Folders and Files

cjcox · August 19, 2009 9:46AM

Hi,

When opening up folders and files in Finder, is there a way that would group all folders first, then files below. When I currently view in Finder, files and folders are listed in Alpha Numeric order and are mixed together in such order.

I was wondering if there was a way to separate folders vs files in Alpha Numeric order?

Thanks for any help!

Chris

piot · August 19, 2009 10:37AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by cjcox

I was wondering if there was a way to separate folders vs files in Alpha Numeric order?

Thanks for any help!

You can do that in "column view" (thats the 4 horizontal bars next to the traffic lights)

You can then order by size or type or date etc.

Also you can select from the "view" menu. "Show view options".

cjcox · August 19, 2009 2:47PM

Was looking for a way to do that in the list mode? Any way to do it in list mode?

Thanks for the tip on columns mode.

kingofsomewherehot · August 19, 2009 3:46PM

Not within OSX by itself. I'm willing to bet you can look around (Google or VersionTracker are good sources) and find a 3rd party app that will allow it. There are all sorts of 3rd party things (many free) that allow you to do all sorts of things to the interface that Apple apparently felt would make it "too complicated".

I'd make a reccomendation, but I don't use anyt "add-on" that allows that (as far as I know).

bbwi · August 19, 2009 5:27PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by cjcox

Was looking for a way to do that in the list mode? Any way to do it in list mode?

Thanks for the tip on columns mode.

Aren't columns essentially lists?

gregg · August 19, 2009 7:41PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by cjcox

Was looking for a way to do that in the list mode? Any way to do it in list mode?

Yes, absolutely. When in list mode, make sure the "Kind" column is viewable. (Go to Show View Options and check Kind) Then click the heading Kind. Done.

If you click the arrow in the Kind column, you go back and forth between folders first and folders last. That should entertain you for awhile.

cjcox · August 20, 2009 7:15AM

If you click the arrow in the Kind column, you go back and forth between folders first and folders last. That should entertain you for awhile.[/QUOTE]

Thanks, that works too in lists, but its still really sorting in Alpha Numeric order and not recognizing folders vs files. For instance, if you have a program that saves a file with an extension that starts with the letters a thru e, those files show up before the folders. And, if an application specially names a folder something different than the word "folder", for example . . Unix Folder, it shows up at the bottom of the list.

Not trying to make this difficult or a game, but was just searching to see if the Mac OS had a way to really recognize and separate files vs folders like in Windows.

My initial way to solve this problem was to number every folder, ex. 100 Folder, 200 Folder, etc, then they would all show up at the top of the list and in order, but that can get very cumbersome to do that in every file structure you create.

Thanks again for the responses, still wondering if there is any solution?

Chris

gregg · August 20, 2009 7:46AM

Well, I only tried one folder to be sure it worked, and it did. Obviously, I didn't have any files with those a-e suffixes, or any "specially named" folders. In fact, I didn't know such folders exist. I assume you aren't referring literally to the name given to the folder, but rather to a special type of folder. In the window I experimented on, there was a folder name starting with 'T' listed before about a dozen files starting with A-S. So it is recognizing folders vs. files, not just sorting by alpha-numeric names. And I leave most of my files without suffixes anyway. I don't have any that require them.

No games, but if you'd mentioned the problems sorting by Kind I wouldn't have thought that you might be unfamiliar with it. (you only had 2 posts at the time, indicating perhaps a new user) No harm done, at least I drew out your more detailed explanation.

cjcox · August 20, 2009 9:34AM

No games, but if you'd mentioned the problems sorting by Kind I wouldn't have thought that you might be unfamiliar with it. (you only had 2 posts at the time, indicating perhaps a new user) No harm done, at least I drew out your more detailed explanation.[/QUOTE]

I wasn't offended at all, no games just meant I wasn't trying to be an AS_.

I appreciate your comments on helping me and my colleagues with this.

I am quite new to the MAC and searched and found this forum for HELP.

Obviously this is not a really big problem, just thought since all my colleagues and myself are new with the MACs (which we all love!) there might be something we were missing.

Thanks for all comments, suggestions, and HELP.

Chris Cox

gregg · August 20, 2009 12:14PM

Glad you weren't offended. Some people hold back on giving detailed "steps" if they aren't sure the questioner is new to Macs. I try to read between the lines and guess.

By the way, you need a [quote] at the beginning of what you're quoting for it to really show up as a quote. Like this:

Quote:

Thanks for all comments, suggestions, and HELP.

If you click on the Reply button, you'll see it the way I typed it. Not that you have to reply, but just if you want to see it.

cjcox · August 21, 2009 9:27PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Gregg

Glad you weren't offended. Some people hold back on giving detailed "steps" if they aren't sure the questioner is new to Macs. I try to read between the lines and guess.

By the way, you need a quote at the beginning of what you're quoting for it to really show up as a quote. Like this:

If you click on the Reply button, you'll see it the way I typed it. Not that you have to reply, but just if you want to see it.

OK, I'm trying to figure out if I'm doing this quote right or not. Here's my try. And again, thanks for the help and advice. (I checked the preview before submitting, I think I got it! Thanks Gregg!

Chris

gregg · August 24, 2009 8:51AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by cjcox

OK, I'm trying to figure out if I'm doing this quote right or not. Here's my try. And again, thanks for the help and advice.

You're welcome. As you can see, I selectively quoted you. You might have noticed, but there is an edit post button on all of your posts. If you click that, you can alter a previous post. So if it doesn't come out the way you wanted, you've got an unlimited number of chances to fix it.

Sorry there's no "perfect" solution to your initial question. Hope you can live with the "partial sorting" OSX does for you. Another option is to use Icon View and Snap to Grid. This allows you to arrange the icons any way you want in the window, but it's manual. The icons will not move dynamically, unlike Arrange by Kind, etc.

The main disadvantage to using Icon View is in the number of icons you can see in a window, which is of course highly dependent on your monitor size. It works well for folders with a somewhat small number of items. You can minimize the icon size, and I think changing the label position to right side saves a little space too.

Finder Question - Viewing Folders and Files

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