Who uses column view?

HDL

I noticed that I've never seen a video about OS X with someone using column view. It's always icon view. Am I missing something?

Column view, in my opinion, is the most useful for several reasons. When selecting an item, I get detailed information about it right away without having to press ⌘I. For me this is very useful, because at a glance I can see how big the item is, when it was created, modified, last opened, etc. If you select a folder, you immediately see everything it contains without having to enter it. This also lets you paste items from your clipboard into it, something you can't do in icon view unless you enter it first. After entering a folder, you can still see what's in the enclosing folder, useful when you need to analyze, compare, or transfer things between them.

One of the most useful things for navigation, I find, is using the keyboard to type the first letter (or first few) of whatever you're looking for. Say I'm in /Applications and want to jump immediately to Safari. I can just press the letter 'S' and be there in a flash. You can do this in icon view too, but if you jump to a folder, you can't view what's in it until you double click or press ⌘O. In list view, you need to use the arrow key to "open" a folder. But if you do, any key you press will apply to both the folder you're in AND the enclosing folder! So let's say I have a file named "key.txt" in my selected folder, and in /Applications I have "Kega Fusion." In column view, pressing 'K' will bring me to the "key.txt" file I want (I chose this folder for a reason). But in list view, pressing 'K' will take me to Kega Fusion. If I wanted Kega, I wouldn't have selected and entered another folder in the first place.

So yeah, there's my short rant. I see so many good reasons to use column over the other choices. What do you guys think?

menace690

I use List View primarily.

I tend to like to sort by date, size, etc

Also, I have lots of files with long file names and I find that column view is a PIA to resize. (You have to resize each column EVERY time you reopen the folder)

Pixelcade

All columns all the time here. I find it faster to navigate.

menace690

FWIW: A couple tips and tricks for the Finder to make my life easier.

I add the following folders to the Dock
Applications
Documents
Downloads

I have them in List view. Absolute fastest way to Navigate those folders. One click and I can get to any file any number of layers deep. Plus it gives me a Pseudo Start Menu, where I can access apps FAST.

The search bar at the top of every window used to annoy the hell out of me. I eventually found that you could make it save your last search settings. I specifically hate that it searched my whole mac and contents by default. Now I have the quick folder/filename search and can change it as I need to the more thorough search.

savvos

I use list view pretty much all the time. If I need to open something and I know what it is, I pretty much always launch if from Spotlight and don't even bother with Finder.

seanstar

I sense a site poll...

Also, list view.

Niemann

Poll coming.

mossy_11

I have my four most frequently used folders in the dock (with list view).

When in the Finder I default to column view because it is faster for traversal, but usually switch to list view if I'm only interested in the contents of the current directory.

Squishy Tia

savvos wrote:

I use list view pretty much all the time. If I need to open something and I know what it is, I pretty much always launch if from Spotlight and don't even bother with Finder.

I'd do that too, but um, spotlight made playing WoW off of a HD totally grindtastic because every single time WoW saved a preference (i.e. constantly), the entire freaking HD would get indexed. And on a HD with literally 1.2 million files, um, it ground to a halt. So I had to disable spotlight.

I really don't see why the old Command-F can't make a comback. Sherlock 2 was eleventy billion times faster than spotlight will ever be, and didn't index until you TOLD it to, whereas spotlight you have to opt-out, which can be very very destructive to a drive that just went south and needs recovering.

I miss being able to be able to find by filename and not deal with index crap. Even Windows' searches don't require indexing to be turned on for christ's sake. Why does OS X?

On topic: I use list view. Column view is way too wonky for subdirectory navigation via the keyboard. If I need info on what the file I have highlighted is, I hit spacebar for QuickLook.

menace690

This should help:
System Preferences
Spotlight
Privacy Tab
Add the WoW folder where the preferences are being modified.

Squishy Tia

Oh I already knew about that trick. I just prefer to keep spotlight off. Less intrusion = a good thing. EasyFind makes a palattable replacement.

menace690

I don't know anything about Easy Find, but turning of indexing is easy and I use find by filename myself as mentioned above. Suits my needs.

Squishy Tia

The problem comes in that it's an opt-out system, not opt-in. I don't want all of my drives indexed, and especially not my SSDs. Apple should never have tied spotlight into its basic find as a prerequisite. They reinvented the wheel, and it turned out to be square.

And the general HD thrashing I could do without...really without.

menace690

If its still doing that, turn off spotlight altogether:
http://osxdaily.com/2009/09/20/disable-spotlight-in-mac-os-x-10-6-snow-leopard/

jack59splat59

I always like to look at icons. It makes it a little slower to navigate, but, for some reason, I still like it.

speedofmac

I'm an icon view guy, but I'm not sure sure why. Here's how I find myself using it:

I certainly type file names to find them in icon view
Command + work as back and forward (also works in column view);
Command + down arrow will open a directory (also works in column view);
Command + up arrow will go up a directory (also works in column view);
When you open a folder in icon view, pressing the up down will select an icon in the top row of a folder (usually top right)
*When you open a folder in icon view, pressing the up arrow will select an icon in the bottom row of a folder (usually bottom right)
You can select files and folders not strictly alphabetically by holding down shift and using the arrow keys to move and select the item up, down, right, or left of the one that was most recently selected

The starred one works in icon and list view, and it can come in handy sometimes. I use the last one pretty often, too, because after selecting them with Shift + arrow keys, I can open them with Command + down.

It's certainly a matter of personal preference, but I find that I can type and use the arrow keys much faster than I can use a mouse. I often find myself just using the arrow keys and occasionally holding down Command to go up or down a directory level.

menace690

Really late post to this topic... but just found this incredibly useful app.

http://www.alfredapp.com/