Mac OS X's user interface for most things is usually pretty intuitive. However, the Finder is something I have some problems with.
First, there's the whole spacial-mapping thing, where folders are laid out spacially, requiring you to actually move folders around so they don't land on top of each other. I know UI gurus are big fans of this, but I just don't get why. It seems like much more work for no apparent gain except in very specialized circumstances which I have yet to encounter.
Second, and more annoying, there's the occasional thing you want to do, that seems quite reasonable, but just baffles you. Like you are in a folder, and you pick up an item and want to drag it to your parent. Is there any way to do this without dropping it and switching the Finder view to either show parents, or opening up a new Finder window?
Another Finder problem bit me recently. I was trying to copy a file from my wife's account to my account. I thought I would be all Mac-like and use the Public Drop Box, a folder for each user that exists solely so that users can drop files there. However, my wife is not an admin, and I just could not get to the parent of her home directory. Therefore, there is no apparent way to navigate to my drop box. I also couldn't find a way in Finder to just jump to a folder. Eventually I cheated and opened up a Terminal and typed "open ~ahyatt/Public/Drop\ Box", but it felt wrong. I must be missing something here. I can't believe the Public Drop Box is not accessible.
Then again, the Mac is great for sharing things between computers, with "Bonjour" and various other technologies. But sharing things among accounts on computers? It's tough as hell, man! And it makes no sense that I can share things with another computer easier than I share things within the computer.
Whoops, it looks like this little rant has ended up on a completely different topic than the one I started with. Sorry, folks!
Posted by ahyatt at October 15, 2005 08:27 PMAs far as spatial mapping goes, try "View as Columns" (command+3). That also makes it easy to move a file to a parent folder.
Posted by: Brian Marston on October 17, 2005 01:02 PMYeah, I do tend to use the "View as Columns" mode. It's just a shame that other modes can't let you navigate back up easily. At least I think they can't. I may be missing something.
Posted by: Andrew Hyatt on October 17, 2005 05:08 PMI know this is a bit late, but you can activate the "Go to Folder" menu item with the keyboard shortcut Command-Shift-G in any Finder window (or just the Desktop). It even has (unambiguous-only) Tab-completion.
It's a big help for folks moving from a Unix-y environment to the Mac. :-)
Posted by: Adam Compton on August 8, 2006 11:50 AM