Microsoft/Mac Monday
Everyday many of us have to open various files on our computers whether they are documents, music, or photo files. It’s something we do out of habit without even thinking, so you probably haven’t really stopped to think about the process of browsing for files. Today we are going to take a look at what it is like to browse for files on both Mac OS X and Vista, to see how easy it is to find the files that you need.
Windows Explorer/Finder
We’ll start-out by simply pointing out the differences in names. When you want to browse for files on Mac, you use “Finder.” When you want to browse for files using Windows, you use the “Windows Explorer.” Both are essentially the same thing and allow you to navigate through folders to find files, they just have different names.
Displaying Files
Everybody seems to like to have choices no matter what the situation, and both Finder and Windows Explorer allow you to choose how you want your files displayed. This may seems like a small detail, but it’s an important one.
Mac OS X
There are four different viewing options in the Finder available to you, and the buttons for changing the view are found at the top. From left to right, you can choose from viewing items as icons, in a list, in 3 columns, or with Cover Flow. By default you view items in 3 columns, but we tend to prefer the list view most of the time, over the others. Shown below is a screenshot with the items displayed as icons.
Vista
Microsoft gives you a few more viewing options in Windows Explorer than Apple gives you with Finder. Once you’re in an area of Windows Explorer where there are files and folders to view, you’ll see the “View” drop-down list up at the top of the Window. Once you click on it, you’ll see the following options:
- Tiles
- Details
- List
- Small Icons
- Medium Icons
- Large Icons
- Extra Large Icons
By default, you’ll view your files as small icons, however you may find if you play around with the options that you’ll like another better. I seem to prefer either Details or List, depending on what I’m doing in Windows Explorer.
Extras we like with Finder
Apple made creating new folders extra simple. It’s not that it is difficult to create a new folder using Windows, it just requires an extra step. In Finder, you just right click and select “New Folder”, it’s the first option, whereas with Windows you right click, go down to “new” then mouse over and select “New Folder.” There’s also a shortcut for creating folders on a Mac which is nice as well, especially if you regularly create new folders. The shortcut is shift+command+N.
Another nice feature is the option to preview what a file looks like with “Quick Look.” You can either look for the “eye” icon up at the top of Finder and click on it to view a quick preview, or if you have clicked on a file, you can press the spacebar. This works for all kinds of files including documents and photos. The image below shows the icon you’re looking for if you want to get a quick look of something, and then it shows the window that appears with your preview.
Extras we like with Windows Explorer
One thing we really like with Windows Explorer is the Groups, Stacks, and Filter features. It’s a new approach for organizing all of your files and once you get into it, you’ll likely find it extremely helpful. In a nutshell, here’s how you’d explain these features:
- Grouping - like a file cabinet that keeps everything nicely organized into folders and then placed in the drawer either in alphabetical order or some other form of organization
- Stacks - allows you to view a “stack” of files
Another really nice feature in Windows Explorer is the breadcrumb navigation system where you can track the movements from folder to folder and file to file. Windows Explorer shows your breadcrumbs along the top in the address toolbar and there are arrows that you can click on to return to a certain point.
Wrapping it up…
Is Finder better than Windows Explorer or Windows Explorer better than Finder? In our opinion, not really. Both offer an easy way to navigate through all of the content on your computer so that you can find what you need, which ultimately is what people want to do.
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Tags: CyberNotes, Apple, Mac OS X 10.5, Mac vs. Windows, Microsoft, Windows Vista
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You said it all about W.Explorer vs. Finder in your last “Wrapping it up” commment.
What I really disliked about Finder when I was using OS X, was that you couldn’t make it have a default view (for ALL folders, also networked, harddrives, dvd drives etc.) & window size. It drove me crazy to see a different view/size everytime I had to open the Finder.
Something I don’t like about Finder or Vista Explorer is the lack of an up button.
Although, I believe there is a way to get it back in Vista. I don’t use Vista very often though.
Famf,
For me I cannot use a mouse, it’s way too slow. So the keyboard shortcut for explorer to go back one previously viewed folder is backspace. Easy eh?
to go up one level is not too shabby alt+up.
Good thing about keyboard short cut is that it allows for absolute confidence of what you are doing “going one level up”, “going back to previous folder I was in” by pressing those keys as long as you are in an explorer window. Where as with a mouse, you need to find the mouse, not too hard, find the button, not too hard, aim, not too hard either, and click , not too hard either. But there are these four steps that must require your eyes.
alt+left arrow /right arrow is to go back/forward folders you’ve viewed just now.
Huh, it doesn’t have that problem for me. It always remembers the last view/size I used.
Actually in both Vista Windows Explorer and Finder you can use the breadcrumbs to navigate up a folder easily.
I don’t think I ever knew that shortcut! I looked it up on a Mac and the corresponding keyboard shortcut is Command+Up. Nifty.
Exactly! It doesn’t return to the default view, but the last view/size you’ve used. Temporary changes become permanent..
On networked drives it was even more annoying: it would revert to the last view/size of *anybody* who had accessed it (so I would see someone else’s preference..).
Ahh, I see what you’re saying now. I could see how that would get annoying.
I know that there’s a program for Vista that can be used to force the OS to not remember any views, but I don’t know if you’re running Vista.
I’m running XP, so no problems with views in Explorer, but the experience I described was the one I had with Finder in OSX 10.3 (I believe, maybe 10.2).
Tabs. That’s all I want to see, tabs. Despite both companies copying tabs from other web browsers into their own neither have put 2 and 2 together and given their file browsers tabs.
No kidding. I think it’s something that should definitely be optional, but having tabs when exploring files would be unbelievably handy in both operating systems.
Maybe you haven’t heard of Vista’s preview pane. It displays previews of files directly using DWM APIs, no lag in opening another window or another app.
That was mentioned in the article, but we’ve found that it doesn’t natively support as many filetypes as Finder.