MS-DOS Executive - the grandfather of our modern day Explorer

The Building Windows 8 blog has a rather detailed, well a lot of words anyway, post of the reasons for and what we can expect in Windows Explorer once Windows 8 ships out; which could possible see a beta reaching our hands in a couple of weeks via the Build conference.

As with previous posts about upcoming changes and improvement the post provides some rather interesting usage details about Windows Explorer, like out of the some 200 commands available in Explorer only 10 are used to any large degree.

Explorer Command usage

For the team behind Explorer there are three major points that they kept in mind as they worked to re-image the file manager we all use at some point everyday.

1. Optimize Explorer for file management tasks. Return Explorer to its roots as an efficient file manager and expose some hidden gems, those file management commands already in Explorer that many customers might not even know exist.
2. Create a streamlined command experience. Put the most used commands in the most prominent parts of the UI so they are easy to find, in places that make sense and are reliable. Organize the commands in predictable places and logical groupings according to context, and present relevant information right where you need it.
3. Respect Explorer’s heritage. Maintain the power and richness of Explorer and bring back the most relevant and requested features from the Windows XP era when the current architecture and security model of Windows permits.

The short story to this is that the Explorer in Windows 8 will sport the Ribbon Bar that was first introduced in Office and has slowly been making its way through all of Microsoft’s software. Personally I think this is a good idea but I can already hear the howl of rage and angry comments headed Microsoft’s way especially given that there will be no “backward compatibility” to the old menubar style of navigation.

Here are some images of what we can expect in the new Explorer with a Ribbon Bar

Windows 8 Explorer - Home tab

Windows 8 Explorer - Share tab

Windows 8 Explorer - View tab

Windows 8 Explorer - Search tab

One of the nice bits of news coming out of this post is that the Explorer team has taken a detailed look at the use of keyboard shortcuts. Some of the most popular posts here at WinExtra has been our posts about keyboard shortcuts, much like this one for Windows 7, so it was nice to see them digging into this aspect of Explorer.

Finally, while most of the work we’ve done is focused on making Explorer work for everyone, we also wanted to make sure we were giving our more sophisticated users a good experience as well.

One of the top requests from more advanced users is for more keyboard shortcuts. All of the existing Windows Explorer shortcuts work in this version of Explorer, but with our new approach, all of the approximately 200 commands in the ribbon now have keyboard shortcuts as well. (Note that we haven’t finalized the exact number of commands in the ribbon yet. It will likely end up between 198 and 203 when we’re done.)

Here is a screen shot of the Explorer Ribbon Bar with the keyboard shortcuts for that part of the ribbon bar; which is accessed as usual by pressing the ALT key and then which ever of the display shortcuts by the option you want to use.

Windows 8 Explorer - Keytips

To finish off here is Alex Simons walking us through some of the new features (thanks to Tom Warren at Winrumors for the YouTube version of the video).

Windows 8 to bring a revamped Explorer along for the ride [Video] is a post from: winextra
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There are two things which help make Windows desktop search a little less than stellar with the first being that for the most part searching your computer in Windows blows. It especially blows when people think that they are being smart by turning off the Windows Indexing Service which is needed to make desktop search even mediocre.

Well apparently the people behind the Windows app Listary have heard the cries of despair and created what they hope will be the answers to your desperate cries.

Featuring:

• Find-as-you-type (which Windows does very well if you have the indexing service enabled)
• Favorites
• Autocomplete
• Wildcards
• special command shortcuts
• Hotkeys
• Regular Expressions – Pro version only
• Export List Content – Pro version only

As well Listary will work from withing the following programs

• Windows Explorer
• Open / Save dialogs
• Windows Desktop
• WinZip
• Task Manager
• 7Zip
• WinRAR
• uTorrent
• Control Panel
• CCleaner
• eMule

While I don’t really have any problem with the native Windows search I think I may just have to check this goodie out at some point.

Download here

Screen shot of Listary Options dialog

Software FYI: Listary – supersizing Windows search is a post from: winextra
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Here is the standard Explorer right click menu

Well, close to standard anyway as the ATI control panel option is available on my system. Now to add the menu option to open the selected folder in the Command Prompt window all you have to do is go Shift + Right Click and you’ll see the new menu item.

Select the Open command window here menu option and you will have a Command Prompt window ready to work in.

Simple stuff

Simple access to the Command Prompt in Explorer is a post from: winextra
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Before accessing your Skydrive account usually meant having to log in through your browser but now thanks to Gladinet you can hook into not only your Skydrive account but a whole list of cloud file storage services through Windows Explorer.

Whether you choose the free edition or the professional release you will at the very least be able to manage your Skydrive account as a mounted drive in Explorer. I have installed the Starter Edition to have a look around and once you install Gladinet it performs as promised.

Step 1 – Install and select what you want to do

To add your Skydrive account as a mounted drive select the second option here. As you can see there are other things besides just hooking into your cloud provider. Unfortunately most of them are only available in the Professional version as you can see by the menu for the notification tray access.

Step Two – Select cloud service

As you can see from the drop down list Gladinet supports the following cloud file storage services:

• EMC Atmos
• Box.net
• Google Picasa
• Google Docs
• Google Docs for Google Apps (Pro)
• Amazon S3
• WebDav
• FTP Server

Step 3 – Windows Explorer

Once you have added your Skydrive account you will be able to open up Explorer (or it will open up automatically once you have added the connector) and access your files in your Skydrive account just as if they were local.

Step 4 – Adding a new cloud provider as a mounted drive

Now if you want to add any of the other supported cloud file storage services just select My Gladinet Drive in Explorer and then double click on “Click to mount [cloud storage].gvd” which will then display the Mounting Virtual Directory dialog where you can select the provider you want to add.

For a full listing of the differences between the Starter Edition and the Professional Edition check out the comparison page on the Gladinet site but to give you an idea here short list of the additional things that comes in the Pro edition

• Advanced Task Scheduler
• Gladinet Side Panel for Explorer
• Settings Manager
• Backup Manager
• Advanced File Transfer
• Security Features
• Advanced Error Handling
• Support for IIS and Apache servers

At the current special of $39.99 I’ve added it to my next month’s “software to buy” list so hopefully the price will still be good then.

Turn your Skydrive account into a local drive … and more is a post from: winextra
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It never fails that every time I open up Explorer I am having to reselect the view I was for a folder, I am having to move it from the default start up position on the desktop and I’m having to re-size the window. I’m not kidding in the least when I say I almost dread having to use the damn piece of crap. I honestly can’t believe that they let this irritating piece of crap program go gold.

Now it’s not that previous versions of Explorer were all the great either but at least those versions were able to remember their settings – at least for the most part. The idea that an integral program to the operating system can’t even keep some of the simplest settings between uses is just plain ridiculous. So I think the time has come to give Explorer the boot and check out some alternatives to it. Any suggestions of replacements for Explorer will be appreciated. Just leave a comment with a link for me to follow and I’ll definitely give them a tryout.

I So Want To Kick Explorer Right In The Ass is a post from: winextra
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