actual picture/document/pdf icon preview?

Posted:
in macOS edited January 2014
Hi all,



I am a new osX / Apple swicher... love it!



I do have a question / comment:



Is it possible (why havent they implemented that yet if it isnt) to display the actual document / picture / pdf / content as opposed to the file association icon in os X? Like showing an icon sized word doc or jpeg and when you mouse over it grows in size a'la the dock?



Seems like that would be a fantastic feature...



if anyone knows about this, please feel free to comment.



Thanks!

Comments

  • Reply 1 of 8
    kickahakickaha Posts: 8,760member
    Windows minimized to the Dock show their content, and you can set the Finder view to show content if possible (ie, the Finder knows how to display it) for icon view: With the Finder window open that you want to change, select 'View-> As Icons'. Then 'View -> Show View Options' In the window that pops up, you'll see "Show Icon Preview". Check that. Now, at the top you'll see 'This window only' or 'All windows'. If you want it to always act like this in icon view, click the latter.



    In Column View, you can bring up the same View Options panel and check 'Show Preview Column'.
  • Reply 2 of 8
    wow!



    thank you very much, works!



    too bad they this isnt available system wide with all files and folders... (one thing i did like in windows xp is that the folders show you a collection of jpegs on the folder view itself...)



    Thanks again,



    Danny
  • Reply 3 of 8
    PS: just found out it doesnt work w/ quicktime files...
  • Reply 4 of 8
    kickahakickaha Posts: 8,760member
    In Column View, it works with some (mpg), but not always others (avi). In general, it depends on whether the file format is one that QuickTime and the Finder can easily view.



    I use Icon View about, oh, never, so... :}
  • Reply 5 of 8
    I just think its a neat way to preview files and folders... you know, a picture says more than a thousand words (insert: "filename")...



    I think it should be easy to implement... perhaps in Tiger...
  • Reply 6 of 8
    buonrottobuonrotto Posts: 6,368member
    QT files can what's called the poster frame, one still frame from the movie that it can use as its preview. You see this when you come across some quicktime movies on the web. The poster frame is the image you see before you click the file. This practice online has mostly been supplanted with a separate reference movie or image -- like on the Quicktime movie trailers page, but QT does still support this sort of thing. Unfortunately, the Finder and other apps don't use this poster frame, if it's even set, as an icon preview. The potential is there though it does require either the author to set it up or you to do it with Quicktime Pro. So it can be laborious. Problem with many movies is that their first frame is black and they fade in, so you can't just take the first frame for a lot of these things and use it as an icon preview.



    BTW, multi-page PDFs won't show an icon preview in the Finder, but single-page PDFs will.
  • Reply 7 of 8
    Multipage PDFs show a preview in column view though. I only use column view so I can't say about any other view.



    Don't forget to make your icons large for graphics folders that you view in icon mode. They make it pretty clear what the graphics looks like
  • Reply 8 of 8
    Quote:

    Originally posted by Code Master

    Multipage PDFs show a preview in column view though. I only use column view so I can't say about any other view.



    Don't forget to make your icons large for graphics folders that you view in icon mode. They make it pretty clear what the graphics looks like




    Yes, but it still doesnt show a preview of the jpeg's contained within the folder, like winXp does... which is pretty neat.
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