As many of you who follow my blog know, I do read the comments and take suggestions that make The Magic Folder better. However, I have seen a number of people with similar requests over the last month that I want to address:
1) Sorting by tags or Filename – This is a common request, for example, to not only move a .DOC extension to the Documents folder but then based on the Tag or Filename further sort the file to another sub folder. This is a very difficult proposition to implement in a gadget. There are so many permutations to this request it becomes a mountain of a task to address:
– Tags only or filename and tag?
– How deep should the folders go based on tag or filename?
– If organizing by tag what happens of it meets more than one tag to folder redirection option?
– And much much more…
I think the problem is many of us love organization by sub folder…count me in that crowd, but Vista is making that less and less important with the powerful desktop search tools. The issue boils down to whether sub folders are even important anymore in Windows Vista. If you add tags to your files such as adding "2007", "San Diego" and "Vacation" to your JPEG images from your vacation, they can be in your pictures folder with everything else. To find them you can create/save a Windows Search to find the images with those tags – and you can even sort by date and they should remain in order they were taken – even though they are mixed in with all your other pictures in a large folder.
Not to dismiss the idea, I understand the desire to sort by sub folder because it is "safer" and more assured to segregate files based on purpose or content. This is an area that takes very careful consideration to implement and if I address it, it needs to be done in a way that keeps the Gadget a Gadget and does not turn it into a full blown application.
2) Cannot be customized – This I think is due to people not understanding how to enter into the options dialog to add their own folder, extensions and change things around from the defaults. I cannot address this any better than I have.
3) Need File Extensions Turned On – Version 1.0 through version 1.5 needed to have the file extensions enabled in the operating system for it to function. Version 1. changed that. If you read further in my blog you will find the revelation that hit me – and it started with a comment from the gadget page.
These are the most common requests that I see but I do want everyone to know that you can always contact me with additional comments, concerns, or request that you have.