Pathfinder is the only Finder you need
Have you ever been using the Finder in OS X and wished it could do more? I remember when 10.4 came along and being so thrilled with the new finder. It was so advanced, it had a sidebar… The novelty wore off pretty quick when I still wanted tabs, breadcrumbs and more features. For a while I was using Captain FTP as my main file browser since it allowed tabbed browsing but it’s tough to push an app that was design for “here-to-there” file transfers into a common file browser. It was actually a bit cumbersome at it.
Then I came across Pathfinder, “Path Finder is an innovative file browser and manager with powerful tools to make you more productive on Mac OS X.” Indeed it is. I wasn’t sold on first try. The reality is I didn’t give it a fair shake. I had it open for about 2 minutes, convinced myself I didn’t like the GUI and moved on before so much as opening the app.
It wasn’t long before frustration with the Finder was overwhelming again and since a few months had passed, I thought I ought to try out Pathfinder again. This time, being determined to do away with Finder, I forced myself to use Pathfinder for a week. Well this time it didn’t take more than a day and I was completely hooked. This is what the Finder was always meant to be. Pathfinder allows total system control and file management. It’s a dock, a path finder, a breadcrumb, file manager, image browser, image converter, pdf viewer text and document editor, ftp client, terminal interface, console panel and so much more all wrapped into one.
It shares some things in common with Finder, like the sidebar that is capable of showing your volumes and shelving your frequently travelled folders and files for easy access. But that’s not all your sidebar needs to show. Click on the bar that defines what is being displayed below it and you will be presented with options such as shelf, volumes, processes, file history, folder history, selection path, info, permissions, iTunes browser, attributes, subversion, preview, hex terminal and console. With all of those choices, you might think that one sidebar is not enough. Well that’s why you can have three more, one on the right, one on the left and one below for a total of four programable sidebars, each with two programable panels. We’re talking total file management here!
With all of this you can imagine I could go on for ever about what I like to do with Pathfinder, so I’ve decided to limit it to some of my favorite features.
Tabs – no common browser, whether it’s for the internet or file browser, should be without tabs. There is no excuse for it.
Drop Stack – you can easily drag a file or folder from tab to tab, but if you haven’t yet figured out where you want to drop that file or folder, simply drop it into the “Drop Stack” and there it will remain until you find the right place to drop it.
Breadcrumb – need I say more? Breadcrumbs are the single most important part of any navigation, so why limit them to websites?
Convert image – resize, crop, and convert the file type of any image. This is ideal in my blogging workflow where I am constantly working images to fit into a particular page size on various blogs.
Common sense – developers are constantly adding to and digging into their contextual menus. It seems as though Pathfinder has caught on to this. Most of most oft used contextual menus items are right there in the information panel, or the tool bar or in the sidebar, etc… One in particular that saves me a butt load of time is the “open package” button found in the information panel of any app or plugin or proprietary file type. Since the RapidWeaver themes I design are all packages, I find I use this button nearly every minute.
Information – know everything about the selected file without hot-key combos or contextual menu selections. Select a file and, depending on your panel configurations, you can know all it’s information, attributes, and permissions right there in front of you.
You may like your Finder just fine, but it you are looking for more, get Pathfinder. Your productivity will go through the roof.