OWC’s Rocketyard on how to make Finder search current folder by default
From Dennis Sellers at OWC, I have to admit I kbew how to do this but never had, but after trying it out for a while I ended uo sticking with it as my default search behavior.
Appleinsider on how to set folder background colors in macOS’s Finder
From Chip Loder at AppleInsider. I have to admit I had no idea this was even possible.
AppleInsider on how to batch rename files in the Apple Finder
You learn something new every day, I didn’t actually realize that this was now built into the Mac OS, as I have always used A Better Finder Rename (and awesome app with more power than this, but it costs $22.95 unlike this tip but if you do check it out also check out A Better Finder Attribute it’s companion app).
So check out this article by Macolm Owen at AppleInsider.
Every editor will need to batch rename files at some point, and the fact that it is so easy to do in the finder now is an amazing thing.
Why is Mac OS Finder iOS Sync so inferior to the previous iTunes Sync
I have said this before and I am sure I will it again, but why when Apple split up iTunes to make Music, Podcast and TV apps and moving iOS music sync to the finder did they make it so far inferior to the previous sync?
Now I know they want you to pay for Apple Music to get your music there, but they were already getting you to pay for music through them. I think they just don’t want you to sync your own music libraries anymore, they want you to just stream your music.
And why is it worse. Well first off if you plug in your iOS device and go to it in the finder, and try and sync any local music (going to the Music tab and selecting any songs or playlists the sync button switches from blue and and press-able to grey and not press-able).
Before any changes it has a sync that you could hit, but not if you make any changes.
This makes the whole iOS thing seem broken, but there is still a way to sync, but you have to get through the whole syncing process once, which can take a very long time. And all it shows for status bars, is a little circle in the sidebar and a syncing thing on the bottom, but both are extremely slow.
The sidebar shows the whole process.
And this is just showing the backup stage, but no indication of how much of the synching this is.
Of Course in some steps you get this wheel, which is pretty much as unhelpful as you can get.
And this process can easily take 30+ minutes.
One it has done a full backup and finished. You can then go into music and select what music you sync and hit sync (it will not be grayed out this time) and only then will your local music sync. And it has to do a whole other sync to get your music over.
Honestly What the Absolute Fuck??!?!?
And even worse sometimes it doesn’t work after 1 sync and you have to do another sync before you are able to move your music over. Really?!?!??!? FUCK YOU APPLE!!!
iTunes never did this.
And with iTunes I could use Wifi Sync. Now I am sure you are saying that you can use Wifi sync with Music, and yes you can, but you can’t stop it.
With iTunes if you had to stop any iOS sync you could force quit iTunes. Sure not an ideal solution, but it worked, and say you could restart or shutdown your computer.
With Music if you have WIFI sync on, you can’t restart or even quit the finder to get it to stop. The only way to get it to stop is to hard reset the computer, which is beyond not ideal.
You can least stop the cable based sync by unplugging the iOS device!
And don’t even get me started with Apple Music. If you sync your library with Apple Music you can get into tons of trouble. There are more forum posts about what this can do to your library than you can read in a lifetime. It has been known to overwrite all your music, replace it with lower quality music, or even different music. And without syncing Apple Music, you can never save any of their music, other than marking it as liked.
Honestly you should be able to keep your streaming music separate from your local library and not be forced to commingle them. And if they do commingle there should be no way that Apple can mess up your local library (which is why they should be kept permanently separate).
The best solution would be able to have local music and streaming music apps that are separate. So nothing can screw each other up. I want to keep my music that I have ripped higher quality and not have anyone touch it or screw it up!
And Apple could now care less about people who have their own music all they care about is people who buy or rent music (yes paying for streaming music is renting music).
My favorite keyboard launcher, LaunchBar will speed up everything outside of your editing and graphics software
So I have written about LaunchBar in the past, but now I am writing about it as something to speed up your workflow when using editing or graphics software. I have been using the amazing LaunchBar from Objective Development for years, and whenever I am in an office using a computer there I feel stunted by not having it.
Now LaunchBar is a tool that does so many things, but my favorite is to the ability to launch application using keyboard shortcuts, and it will learn your shorcuts quickly to speed things up. You hit a quick keyboard shortcut, which brings up LaunchBar and then you type your keys and if the application shows up hit return or push to the down arrow and select what you want to launch. After selecting the thing a few time LaunchBar learns and moves your choice to the top of list.
So to launch I hit Command-Space and the last app I launch shows up, if I want to launch it, just hit enter and it launches.
Or more powerfully you type the initials of an app, and LaunchBar will give you a list, and you select what app you want.
If I want Word, I try Wo or MW.
Then select the App and return and it will learn your initials and move the app up the list and eventually to the top.
This way I can launch any application without ever touching the mouse, and this is HUGE! IT WILL SPEED UP EVERYTHING YOU DO ON THE COMPUTER OUTSIDE OF YOU EDITING OR GRAPHICS APPLICATION!
And Launchbar does so much more. You can do calculator functions, instant web searches, go to web sites, create e-mails from contacts, merge files, check your ClipBoard History, and it is all customizable.
LaunchBar is the so worth $29 or $49 for a family license. It speeds up everything I do on the computer and it can speed things up for you as well.
Mac OS Catalina Finder Save Dialogue box selection inconsistencies
A huge annoyance that I have run into in Catalina, is a major inconsistency of the Finder’s Save Dialogue box. In previous OS’s when I saved a file, the name of the file was always selected when the window popped up. This window shows what I mean.
The problem is that in Catalina the selection of the name seems to be random. Sometimes when I output a file I get it selected where I can use keyboard shortcuts to alter the name if necessary, as always used to happen previous to Catalina. The problem is that sometimes, and I can’t say why or when the selection dialogue shows up unselected, so I can’t use keyboard shortcuts to change the name, but have to use the mouse (or trackball as it is for me) to select the name and change it.
I can’t understand why sometimes the text is selected and sometimes it isn’t. This seems totally random, and I can’t figure out why it happens.
I have posted about it at the Apple community forums, though I don’t expect to hear a response.
Fix for being unable to sync iOS devices in Catalina’s Finder
So my sync stopped working for iOS devices in the Finder in Mac OS 10.15 Catalina. As soon as I made any change to the sync the apply button was greyed out.
Well I went to my /Library/Preferences/ Folder and removed the com.apple.syncserver.plist and the com.apple.finder.plist file (I am assuming it just one of these) but after removing them the apply button was no longer greyed out and I can sync my iOS devices again. You should then restart the finder.
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Update, so this fix is no longer helping me. I just can’t sync anymore. The sync button is OK until I make any changes, then I cannot sync.
A Huge Problem with Mac OS 10.15 Catalina Finder iOS Sync!
OK so I was always worried about them getting rid of iTunes. I have been using it for too many years. Making it 3 apps does not make it any more efficient than one app, in fact I would say it makes it less efficient.
And they have already been changing features, trying to replace Star ratings with heart or no heart after I have been rating songs for years with stars does not work for me.
Catalina though broke up iTunes and moved iOS sync to the finder. Now it still has the same features as the old iTunes sync everyone said, but there is one big one that no one has mentioned that is really messed up!
Now first off I have already said that the new Sync does not give a text description of what is syncing, and while it does eventually show you a progress wheel, it does not show one at first (I can only assume this is the backup stage which always took forever with no indication of how long it takes).
Here my iPad and iPhone are both in that nefarious stage when you have no idea how long the sync will take.
Here you can see my iphone is at least int he progress bar stage, though still less info than old iTunes which told you what it was doing.
Anyway now here is the major problem with having the finder do the sync. If you are syncing an iOS device you cannot restart the computer because it will tell you that that the finder is not done completing the sync! Now with previous versions of Mac OS this still occurred, but you could just force quit iTunes and your computer would restart. You can’t do this with the finder! You can relaunch the finder with a right click in the dock, but the sync continues through this, and I even tried with Activity Monitor and the sync just continues not allowing you to restart. Now maybe there is a process that I don’t know what it is called that I could quit to allow this. Or if I turn off WIFI sync and disconnect the device, maybe it will stop and I can restart, but this is a problem! I am a video editor and there are just times I need to restart, so at the very least their should be a cancel button on iOS sync in the FINDER!!!
I have posted about this at Apple’s Discussions and MacRumors.
A Better Finder Rename 11 for Mac is an awesome upgrade
A Better Finder Rename is a must have app for me. It lets you rename files using various sets of rules, and the latest version 11 is an even bigger upgrade.
You can now add multiple file filterings to a single change making it so different file types have different renaming on a single rename! Wow! And you can save Actions and Presets! And their is now Preview filtering.
This is a must have upgrade for a must have program. I always find it hard to work on a machine that does not have this program installed!
XtraFinder for OS X
I recently discovered Tran Ky Nam’s XtraFinder for OS X.
It is a program that adds extra abilities to the OS X finder. It is intended to add tabs and control tabs within the finder, but since this has been added to Mavericks, it still has many other cool features.
Some of my favorites are recoloring the Finder Sidebar Icons, which I think makes them much easier to see.
Another really cool feature is adding back the full colored label to labels in OS X. Mavericks had changed this behavior to tags, so that there is only a tiny colored dot, but you can turn back on full colored tags which I think makes them much easier to spot.
You can also add items to finder menus:
Here is show hidden items:
And the ability to launch an application as root!
Overall a very cool finder extension, especially for the power user!