TC9 beta - your view modes

[Samuel]

IMO the new view modes are one big feature of TC9.

A) I am just curious what you do with the view modes.
B) I am also curious what you think what else could be done with view modes. (not yet implemented in TC9b2)

A1) Currently I use them to visualize entered zip files with a bright yellow background.
A2) I consider to visualize FTP Connections, search results and certain folders along with the sub folders.
B1) I wish I could visualize quicksearches (ctrl + s)

[Lefteous]

There are folders which I need to sort by date descending to see the latest stuff.
I load custom column views and thumbnail views for certain dirs.

The tab header icons already do a lot of work for recognizing types of dirs. I don't see I'm doing a lot of coloring here.

[ghisler(Author)]

A)
1. I use different color backgrounds and icons for ZIP, FTP, FS plugins, and search results.
2. I switch to thumbnails view in a folder where I store my photos.
3. I sort a specific directory with e-mail templates by name, all other directories by date
4. I show comments in a specific folder with VMWare virtual machines.

B)
I'm curious too!

[fenix_productions]

I will complain again

A) I am using it to just have some custom icons for few folders I usually work with and to set up their sortings. And this is all I can do with this feature.

B) It may be interesting what other users will use but I am not going to have folders views automatically switching while I navigate through folders. To be honest it was always annoying in Windows Explorer to have folders views jumping around.

If I want to have thumbnails view, I switch it on and want to have it until I switch it off and the same goes for full view.

I had been trying to have automatic view mode changes for couple of days and I have been disabling it one after another.
As I mostly use Full view and little more rare Custom (i.e. Comments) I feel no need to have automatic switching to anything different.

Of course, sometimes I also have Thumbnails but only for mass rename or delete. I manage my photos in other applications because TC does not have as many advantages for photos as I would like to.

With better Thumbnails view this feature could work for me but TC's thumbs are very limited compared to more specialised software. The only good thing for it is quick view of images but an amount of additional information about them is not good enough.

Please take a look of few sample thumbnails views (detailed or simplified):
http://www.fenixproductions.pl/files/tc/tc9-ideas/thumbs/geo-setter_001.png
http://www.fenixproductions.pl/files/tc/tc9-ideas/thumbs/xn-view_001.png
http://www.fenixproductions.pl/files/tc/tc9-ideas/thumbs/xn-view_002.png
http://www.fenixproductions.pl/files/tc/tc9-ideas/thumbs/xy-plorer_001.png
http://www.fenixproductions.pl/files/tc/tc9-ideas/thumbs/zoner-photo-studio_001.png

If TC could have something similar AutoView Modes would be a lot better: either thumbnails list or custom overlay icons (both proposed years ago).

[krstatzar]

Would be nice to see some videos of routines of using TC for specific tasks or showcasing some of the features.

[milo1012]

With better Thumbnails view this feature could work for me but TC's thumbs are very limited compared to more specialised software. The only good thing for it is quick view of images but an amount of additional information about them is not good enough.

Please take a look of few sample thumbnails views (detailed or simplified):
...

I may be wrong, but it seems you never tried it:
With the fitting content plug-ins, isn't
Configuration -> Thumbnails -> Fields by type
exactly what you're asking for? (especially since you can put in line breaks / newlines)

I don't use this for images, but there are enough image meta data plugins out there to satisfy your needs, e.g.
http://totalcmd.net/plugring/iptcwdx.html
http://totalcmd.net/plugring/wdx_ImgSize.html
http://totalcmd.net/plugring/shelldetails.html
http://totalcmd.net/plugring/exif.html

Personally, I use this for mp3 files:
[=wdxtaglib.Title]\n[=wdxtaglib.Artist]\n[=wdxtaglib.Album]\n[=wdxtaglib.Year]

[Lefteous]

search results

I can only second that. Loading the right custom column view along with a nice search icon and a matching color in the tab header automatically is just magic.

[fenix_productions]

OFFTOPIC?

I may be wrong, but it seems you never tried it:
With the fitting content plug-ins, isn't
Configuration -> Thumbnails -> Fields by type
exactly what you're asking for? (especially since you can put in line breaks / newlines)

I am not a first time user* and I had tried it a lot (and even made some posts about).

I resigned from using this feature for photos because that additional information is not nicely shown, i.e.
even if configurable you cannot fully hide empty elements, so you may end up with couple of empty lines.

I didn't check but isn't Fields by type global setting? Or with new beta it can be assigned to specific view? With "view assignment" I could make some walkarounds to fill my needs.

I am afraid there is only one thumbnail view mode with its limitations like specific previews sizes and info fields definitions.

---
I still think that custom overlays would be better than simple text below thumbs since other apps have it and I find it very useful.

Seven years ago I believed TC version would be much more configurable with such overlays but there was not a single person to reply:
http://www.ghisler.ch/board/viewtopic.php?t=23870


*) ~15 years of TC experience. Couple of plugins written and abandoned All plugins tested and stored (true archive with GBs of all versions that've ever appeared).

[milo1012]

[OFFTOPIC]

I am not a first time user* and I had tried it a lot (and even made some posts about).

I'm quite aware of that, that's why I wrote that I may be wrong.

I resigned from using this feature for photos because that additional information is not nicely shown, i.e.
even if configurable you cannot fully hide empty elements, so you may end up with couple of empty lines.

Okay, but none of your screenshots above show such thing clearly. All I see is additional text fields for all image files, not something dynamically aligned, like when a single file is missing some field.
[/OFFTOPIC]

[fenix_productions]

@milo1012
I know those screenshots are not clear enough but they may show some possibilities when it comes to TC as we can have custom columns and fields in addition to their layout.