With much software reaching some sort of maturity I am often shocked to see that much of this stuff has been on my Apple devices for most of their existence. Its also a shock when this maturity brings some sort of reckoning; subscription pricing, new cloud based structures or a complete rebuild. Some entities do this very well. For example the OmniGroup has foreshadowed its development path for the current year.
Pathfinder 8 (a Finder replacement) seems to have struggled in this regard. It seems to have launched Pathfinder 8 before it was really ready and havenāt explained that the apparently much need rebuild/rewrite from the ground up may see some functionality lost and if such loss of functionality is permanent or temporary. The Pathfinder people, or at least the poor chap who does the support has received a fair amount critical comment on the support forum. Many have downgraded back to Version 7. This App has been around a while with a very loyal band of supporters - so itās a shame Pathfinder havenāt seemingly able to explain what they are doing and why and map out the way forward. Perhaps there was a clue when the upgrade cost was only $20. Maybe the new MAC OS Finder is going to be a much more serious rival. Anyway its seems perplexing. The good news is the latest version of Pathfinder 8 at least seems much more stable and the almost hourly crashes seem to have gone.
Pathfinder fans will hope its all progress in the coming months, ā¦
Iāve been using a Path Finder for many years and have paid for each upgradeā¦that was until Path Finder 8 came along. Unfortunately it wasnāt a very positive upgrade experience. Most notably, all of my carefully crafted sidebars disappeared without warning when I upgraded from Path Finder 7. And, while they still have support for sidebars, there isnāt currently a convenient way to hide and show them.
Iāve since moved to Forklift 3. Iāve played with it in the past and really liked the app overall. There used to be a few deal breakers (including lack of support for Default Folder X). Recent updates have addressed these shortcomings and Iām really enjoying using Forklift 3. It feels more modern than Path Finderā¦and itās included in my Setapp subscription.
I donāt really have a horse in this race, but itās a shame a great app has these issues and of course it triggers people to look at alternatives. Even though I have gone back to Pathfinder 7, I am not sure if it will survive the pending new OS upgrade. I have at times looked at Pathfinder replacements. There are a small handful and agree Forklift seems the alternate best in class.
Iāve some contact with the developer of Forklift and find that heās very open to feedback. Case in point, many of the items on my wish list have been implemented.
Iād never even thought of Forklift as being in the same space as Path Finder ā I always thought of it as being a communication program like Transmit. Looking at the web site, it still seems like they are emphasizing the Transmit like features, though they do now call it a ādual pane file manageā and have an option for it to replace the Finder. If I start having problems with Path Finder I will look into this more closely.
Well if there was an ability to configure the Side Bar - as with Finder - to include Tags - and so enable drag and drop to add - that would be a big plus.
In the past Forklift has had more of an emphasis on FTP, etcā¦but it has evolved into being a direct competitor to Path Finder.
Forklift has a slick UI and some clever power user features. For example, you can select a bunch of files/folders and choose File > New Folder with Selection to create a new folder that contains the selected items.
I recall seeing a note in the release notes about the sidebar change. They made them more customizable. I am not at my Mac so I do not know where the setting is to bring them back
They did make them more customizable (which is great), but unfortunately they removed the feature to hide/show sidebars. Even the Finder has this feature. Hopefully they bring this back at some point.
āThey did make them more customizable (which is great)ā
I thought the changes were cosmetic more than substantive. PF8 issues may well be a catalyst for more changes in Forklift! What is quite nice on Forklift is the ability to create your own āGroupsā on the side bar and name them as suits.
In something so fundamental as a file manager there are lots of use cases and the Pathfinder Support Forum highlights how different people use cases vary - particularly use of the side bar.
I am surprised Tim Stringer you didnāt just go back to PF 7. It still seems generally more versatile than Forklift, having said that I am playing around with Forklift with one eye on developments at PF
I briefly considered going back to Path Finder 7ā¦but that would have been a temporary change at best and thereās no guarantee that it will work with or be supported in macOS 10.14 (Mojave).
Overall, Forklift is a better fit for me. And, in some ways, itās much more versatile than Path Finder. I especially like being able to add collapsable groups to the sidebar.
@timstringer did you find a way to set desktop items open in Forklift? I, like you, went to Forklift 3 after seeing what PF8 had done. So I have one machine still on PF7 and my main machine on Forklift. This desktop thing is really annoying though. If you have a way to tell that to the dev, that would be nice.
And for your info, the āfeatureā to make a new folder with selected items has been in PF for a while;-)
Did you find a way to set desktop items open in Forklift? I, like you, went to Forklift 3 after seeing what PF8 had done. So I have one machine still on PF7 and my main machine on Forklift. This desktop thing is really annoying though. If you have a way to tell that to the dev, that would be nice.
Iām not 100% sure I understand the question. If you double-click on a folder on the desktop do you want the folder to open in Forklift? I donāt think this functionality is supported in either Forklift or Path Finder. When interacting with the desktop I think youāre essentially using the Finder. Having said that, Iām sure this could be accomplished through some sort of a clever hack. I verified the Instant Send feature of Launchbar also makes this possible
I created keyboard shortcuts in Keyboard Maestro to open commonly used folders in whatever file manager Iām currently using. They all start with ^ā„ (Control+Option) For example, ^ā„R opens my Records folder, ^ā„D opens my Downloads folder and ^ā„- opens the desktop folder. I use this all the time and find it very convenient.
And for your info, the āfeatureā to make a new folder with selected items has been in PF for a while;-)
Thanks for the heads up. Not sure how I missed that one.
Yes, thatās exactly what I was talking about when you double-click a folder or a disk in Pathfinder (provided you have show Path Finder Desktop ON and Hide Finder Desktop) they open in Path Finder. So this is possible to implement. Now we just need the people at BinaryNights to do it:-)
I still have an unregistered version of Forklift but I have to say I found Forklift support pretty good in terms of explaining things. By contrast Pathfinder support is bewildering in the context of what PF 7 does and the newly developing PF 8. You are left hanging in the air even when you query what was core functionality in PF7 - no longer in PF8. You might say Forklift does not perfectly meet my use cases, but I will give them a good try if they talk sensibly to their users.
I donāt really notice much difference in Path Finder 8, but I am probably not taking full advantage of it. I use it for dual pane with a preview on the right, copy as path, and very good batch file renaming.
