Total Commander too unintuitive?

[spikey]

Total Commander is very capable and have been using it since v6.50. It can do things no other file manager can.

However I do not use it every day and each time I come back to it, it is puzzling to remember how to use features I have customised or how to install new features from plugins.

At the moment I am trying to use the AddOn bar and also install some plug ins. Each time I have to go back and search the forum for the right way to do these things but it is not always successful. Then I have to ask questions here for relatively simple things.

The frustration and exhaustion is so great for me that I would immediately drop TC and use another file manager if it did what TC could do.

It's very frustrating! I wonder if the lack of an intuitive interface is something other people also find difficult?

[petermad]

Maybe you could benefit form trying my Extended Menu (see signature below for link). Whis this you don't have to remember a lot of keyboard shortcuts and "hidden" features - it is all in the menu.

When you don't want to use the menu, you just choose your normal language in TC's Language setting.

[Hacker]

spikey,
You can always refer to the Help file by pressing F1.

Roman

[spikey]

spikey,
You can always refer to the Help file by pressing F1.

Roman

If the help file is as good as you suggest then there would be no need for this forum!

[spikey]

Maybe you could benefit form trying my Extended Menu (see signature below for link). Whis this you don't have to remember a lot of keyboard shortcuts and "hidden" features - it is all in the menu.

When you don't want to use the menu, you just choose your normal language in TC's Language setting.

Hello Peter. Thanks for the link. I went there and downloaded the zip file. What is the next step?

[petermad]

Double-click on the zip-file - this is how plugins and language files are installed in TC.

Make sure you downloaded the menus for the right version of your TC and the right version of your Windows

[Hacker]

spikey,

If the help file is as good as you suggest then there would be no need for this forum!

You might be suprised. People often ask questions that are already answered in the Help file.

Roman

[nsp]

Total Commander is very capable and have been using it since v6.50. It can do things no other file manager can.

However I do not use it every day and each time I come back to it, it is puzzling to remember how to use features I have customised or how to install new features from plugins.

At the moment I am trying to use the AddOn bar and also install some plug ins. Each time I have to go back and search the forum for the right way to do these things but it is not always successful. Then I have to ask questions here for relatively simple things.

The frustration and exhaustion is so great for me that I would immediately drop TC and use another file manager if it did what TC could do.

It's very frustrating! I wonder if the lack of an intuitive interface is something other people also find difficult?

TC support highly customization and every one can make it's own usage of it. I also admit that a bundled version (with menu, tools and plugin) could help to have a less frustrating experience.

Anyhow, what you can do to not have to search again and again for the same thing in the forum is to create your own wiki or md page. Put it in your total commander folder and make your complete TC installation/configuration portable.

I can advise you to :
- always keep extended menu it will save you a lot of time and gives good info on how to create user command.
- add ultra tc editors to have a better view on ini customization and quickest access on menu, plugin management..
- keep also TC Change viewer it will help to understand history of TC...
- install the addons/plugins you need in %COMMANDER_PATH%\addon
- if you do some useful search save it for later or to remember how you did it

[Phred]

spikey,
You can always refer to the Help file by pressing F1.

Roman

If the help file is as good as you suggest then there would be no need for this forum! :)

I regret to have to say that I do so agree with you, spikey. TC is a tool written by a programmer, Author Ghisler, with the business managed by his brother, I understand. The limited resources dictate that little usability testing and opinion-forming debate is available. It's an excellent tool, but there's a lot of hunting required, as demonstrated by the comments on Help.
I have a long list that I must compile, but in the meantime (without mentioning this very forum..), a short definition:

intuitive
adjective
1 Using or based on what one feels to be true even without conscious reasoning; instinctive.
OED

[spikey]

I regret to have to say that I do so agree with you, spikey. TC is a tool written by a programmer, Author Ghisler, with the business managed by his brother, I understand. The limited resources dictate that little usability testing and opinion-forming debate is available. It's an excellent tool, but there's a lot of hunting required, as demonstrated by the comments on Help.

I really do like TC but it can be such hard work sometimes to make it do simple things because of the re-learning I have to go through each time I use it.

[DjobyDjoba]

I wonder if the lack of an intuitive interface is something other people also find difficult?

I find difficult to remember many little tips, keyboard shortcuts, that make things more efficient. I often feel that there are better/faster ways to do the things I do, and indeed it's frustrating. For example, copy/move/rename files or folders, there are many ways to do it. And the way that I choose, instinctively, is often the basic way (to move a file: go to the right panel, change the folder, go back to the left panel, then F6...). So yes, it is frustrating, because I consider myself as a power user with the programs I use, but it's not easy to really use TC the powerful way. So, regularly, I take the time to re-read the help, to look at more efficient ways to do, and to try to change my basic habits of doing things. I succeed, with time and persistence, and it is very rewarding to feel mastering a powerful tool.

And I can't imagine using another file manager. I couldn't do without many powerful commands of TC. And the help file is good IMO, so I know where to look at if I search something.

[DRP535]

Total Commander is very capable and have been using it since v6.50.

I have the opposite problem. I've been using it since it was called Norton Commander, ran under some version of DOS I can't even remember and consisted of two blue windows side by side you could open and close with a press of ALT+F1 for the left and ALT+F2 for the right. It was a real buzz when a mouse came along and you could use that too! Before then it was keyboard-only.

I'm so rusted-on now that when faced with a computer that doesn't have TC installed, it's like my right arm has been cut off!

[Hacker]

DRP535,

I've been using it since it was called Norton Commander

Total Commander has never been called Norton Commander.

Roman

[DRP535]

DRP535,

I've been using it since it was called Norton Commander

Total Commander has never been called Norton Commander.

Ahhh, grasshopper, this was in the days before you were born! Peter Norton's Norton Commander was before Symantec and before Windows Commander. It was the inspiration (the nicest way of saying it got copied) that created Windows Commander when it ceased being developed and was abandoned by Symantec when Peter Norton sold out. It was very much the same design philosophy that you see in TC today.

This was in the days before Windows 3.1. Windows 95 was a distant furturistic concept and Apple were broke.

[Hacker]

DRP535,
A simple "ah, yes, I didn't mean it literally" would have been enough.

Roman