Default Folder X 6 development update

While it’s been slow going, I’ve gotten a few new features put together in the ongoing development of version 6 of Default Folder X. I’m sharing two here because I’m very happy to have gotten them up and running, as I personally find them really useful.

Expanded Filename Editing Field

It seems like such a minor thing, but when you’re saving something like a web page that has a long name, it’s maddening that Save As dialogs have such a tiny edit box for the filename. The long name runs past the end of the edit field and you have to click and drag or use the arrow keys to get to the rest of it if you want to make any changes.

While it required way more juggling than I expected, Default Folder X 6 expands the filename field to a usable size.

Keyboard-based Access to Recent and Favorite Items

I’m personally a very keyboard-biased user. I’d rather use shortcuts and type than take my hand off the keyboard to click around with the mouse. As a result, Default Folder X has always had the ability to assign keyboard shortcuts to Favorites and to access recently used items. Up until now, however, that didn’t include just typing to select exactly what you wanted. In version 6, that’ll be an option:

I’ve used a “Sublime Text-style” selection method, where fuzzy matching gives you results that include file, folder and application names that contain the letters you’ve typed, even if there are some missing in between. It also favors capital letters and the first letters of words.

You’ll see that the top match in the image above when typing “roc” is “ReactiveObjC” because of the capitalized R, O and C in the correct order, with “ProcessController.m” further down the list even though it contains “roc” in lowercase. I’m still tweaking this, but I find the results pretty quick and intuitive when looking for something (though granted, the results lower down in the list tend to appear almost random until you look hard at them).

As a developer, the danger I see with this feature is that people will want me to reproduce all kinds of options from similar keyboard-based utilities like LaunchBar and Alfred and I’m not sure how far to go with that. This isn’t meant to replace those (I’m a long-time LaunchBar user myself), but some additional tweaks could be nice…

If you want to help test…

While these (and other) features are still in development and thus a bit rough around the edges, I’d welcome input if you’ve got some time to try them out and provide thoughtful feedback. Email DefaultFolderX@stclairsoft.com if you’re interested.

6 Responses to “Default Folder X 6 development update”

  1. Jörg Weijers says:

    Dear Jon,
    Gladly to take a Beta on a testdrive at OSX 10.15.7 for the good cause and longlasting request at Apple to fix this Hardcore OSX Gui fix. I would help out to bring your holy grail uttil fix on Twitter or LinkedIn groups.

    Best regards,
    Jörg Weijers

  2. […] I outlined the details of these features in a previous post. […]

  3. rendervore says:

    Looking forward to trying out version 6 when it comes out, because I’ve searching for a way to make the “Save” filename field longer which lead me to this page. I’ll gladly purchase the software once that feature is added.
    (Any news or updates since last year?)

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