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- foolfromhell, on 10/12/2007, -1/+3165 freaking dollars? Even Australian, thats a LOT....
Pricing software that only tech-oriented people would use for that much is like saying "Pirate me!!!" - inactive, on 10/12/2007, -8/+21Absolutely. And if you'd like to, ahem, try it out...
http://www.mininova.org/get/405690 - kayakto, on 10/12/2007, -2/+10and i thought most of diggers use total commander.. i do
- blargman, on 10/12/2007, -3/+10i have to ask, erm, wth do you need anything to replace explorer with? it works, and works well. long live explorer!
- zcreem, on 10/12/2007, -2/+8Total commander is the best file manger by far.
Most diggers seem to be under the legal and so don't recognise an interface without pretty shiny buttons to click. - warbird, on 10/12/2007, -0/+6midnight commander on linux looks suspiciously like norton commander on DOS
- susan87, on 10/12/2007, -1/+6do people really use those text ones?
- inactive, on 10/12/2007, -1/+5Is there any explorer replacement that let's you use mouse gestures? I use 'em in Opera all the time now, and have the problem of trying to use them in Explorer as well. Hehe.
- sishgupta, on 10/12/2007, -4/+8launchy is NOT a file manager, it is merely an application launcher. Hence the name, launchy.
- Guspaz, on 10/12/2007, -1/+5My complaint is that none of these actually replace the explorer process, they are actually just file browsers. So they're not actually replacements for Windows Explorer, just the Windows Explorer file browser.
I'm sure some of them are great products, it's just that the article description here on Digg sort of got my hopes up (even though it said file manager in the description).
Personally, I'd like the GNU toolkit and Bash on Windows. Existing ports of Bash don't seem to do a very good job at integrating with Windows, although the GnuWin32 toolkit is rather nice. - Hiker, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3Try a program called StrokeIt (not a joke) for all your mouse gesturing needs. Brilliant program!
- NTolerance, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3What's wrong with cygwin?
- OBKenobi, on 10/12/2007, -1/+3OK, you Australians, we know you're happy that Directory Opus comes from your country, but let's be a little more objective about this, ok?
- wolver1ne, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2Servant Salamander is by far the best as far as I am concerned. It's fast and not UI bloated.
- Modulo, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2Guspaz - the rest of us somehow managed to make that massive cognitive leap that it took to see that he was talking about file explorer, so try not to get your pocket protector in a twist, nerdly.
- OBKenobi, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2Directory Opus is actually older, I used it on my Amiga many years ago. But on the PC, I've used Total Commander ever since Symantec foolishly killed off Norton Commander.
Also worth noting is half the other programs listed there are a copy of TC, so that should tell you something!
Another reason it can't be beat is all these plugins:
http://www.totalcmd.net/ - salmonmoose, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2Objectivity or not (I actually knew one of the developers back when it was on Amiga), DOpus blows anything else out of the water if you're looking at advanced file managment.
It's highly configurable, support scripting, FTP over SSH, and just plain works with windows.
To show I'm not truly biased, It would be nice if you could put a 'root' directory link in each folder - not a huge flaw I guess.
DOpus is the file manager I judge other file managers by. - gmallard, on 10/12/2007, -1/+3Far looks suspiciously like midnight commander on Linux.
And yes, people still use the text based managers.
When I work on Windows boxes, I'm also a Total Commander fan. - chutz, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2Err, that's actually http://www.lsdev.org/
- clawlor, on 10/12/2007, -2/+4Been using xplorer2 for a while now(gratis version). I still keep finding neat little features, one I use often is the ability to run shell commands from the address bar, or just type $ to bring up a cmd prompt in the active folder. Also integrates nicely with Tortoise SVN.
- OBKenobi, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2"i have to ask, erm, wth do you need anything to replace explorer with? it works, and works well. long live explorer!"
How about some fricken' batch operations for one thing? How about a decent file association manager? Detailed file and directory info? Advanced sorting options? Quick view? Tabs? I could go on... - bissjoe, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1ExplorerXP is great for me. It is not only dual-pane, you can arrange more than two windows in non-overlapping positions and ExplorerXP will remember their positions at next launch (even after rebooting the computer). Also you can define keyword shortcuts for very useful commands (e.g. create a new folder, copy full path name as text).
- fistandoodle, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1I actually often still use winfile. Microsoft File Manager.
Found a copy of it on an old post at a BartPE forum.
Opens directories fast, doesn't load icons (other programs will load the icon, thus meaning windows reads into the file. And if its a virus, my AV will say so. Or if I have a directory with, say, 200 .exe files, windows will load the icons for each, and it will drag down my machine. Winfile doesn't do this. And as yet no other file manager I've seen lets me.) No context menus though. - inactive, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1"Windows Explorer, the default file manager for Microsoft Windows, hasn't really changed all that much over the years."
Back when AT&T was the only phone company there was a saying "you can have any color phone you like as long as it is black".
That is what you get when you have monopoly or near monopoly power. Competition not only spreads the money around, it make for innovations for the end user. - dope, on 10/12/2007, -1/+2My choice is Far, this tool is more nerdy than all other
- salmonmoose, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1You're kind of half right.
They don't replace the explorer process fully. They do however remove the need to run it to browse files. If you want to completely get rid of Explorer.exe, you can in fact set some of these as your shell, or alternatively run a shell replacement like Blackbox or Geoshell. Or just a task launcher.
Unfortunately most of the shell replacements out there just don't cut it, and I usually end up using explorer for my taskbar/systray. - j450n, on 10/12/2007, -1/+2Great review - thanks for saving me from having to test all these out. Chalk up another fan of directory opus!
- spacey, on 10/12/2007, -3/+3Thx :)
I enjoyed doing this because it introduced me to Directory Opus, which I like more and more each time I use it. - inactive, on 10/12/2007, -3/+5"Because I can"
- mistshadow2k4, on 10/12/2007, -3/+4Directory Opus is good (I once tried it for a few days), but too rich for my blood. Not when I can open those directories in Konqueror in Linux. Directory Opus wasn't as intuitive as Konqueror and doesn't look as nice to me -- and yes, Konqueror is quite feature-rich.
PowerDesk is pretty good, but I've tripped on a nasty bug in both versions 5 and 6. Pasting a file into another directory, whether using a single- or dual-pane view, crashes the program. That's right, a basic function like paste crashes it. I tested both versions on Windows 2000 And XP with different hardware and it always did that. No thanks. - inactive, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1I know Explorer has keyboard shortcuts, but to use them for all tasks is AWKWARD.
Expecially at the smaller companies I have worked at where EVERYTHING is on the network in complex network trees ( network tangles really ). Navigating up and down these trees with explorer is tiresome.
Being able to link to director ( ln -s ) like you can linux would be a big help
Every time I get a new job where I have to work on windows box I get the ms developers "powertoys" that lets me click on folder to get an msdos prompt in whatever directory I am using. I also install cygwin and set up a "bash this" option in my context menu to do something similar to the power toys. I also get a 3rd party tool that creates multiple desktops and puts the date in my task bar. - Rosco, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Nice, been looking a long time for something like A43. That one is a keeper for me. Now this is why I joined Digg!
- inactive, on 10/12/2007, -3/+4My favorite is Directory Opus by a long shot.
- mungk, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Servant Salamander is awesome! I've been using it for years. For those interested: http://www.altap.cz/
- radu79, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1I am using WinNavigator, for 6 years, and I am very happy with it.
http://www.wnsoft.com/wn/index.html - sailor, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Powerdesk or Total commander should meet your needs...I used to use Norton Navigator but it was never my favorite.
- mojo, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Anyone try FreeCommander?
http://www.freecommander.com/ - chutz, on 10/12/2007, -1/+2Not being a windows user myself, and preferring the commandline (bash) for file management I am not exactly an authority.
That said, I have heard that Litestep ( http://www.litestep.net/ ) can replace the explorer process on windows. - fistandoodle, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Awesome tip (That $ thing).
I just recently found out ctrl+insert added new tabs.
This little program surprises me more and more. - Ryosen, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1There's an option to make it automatically refresh.
- sailor, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Total Commander or Powerdesk work the best for me...
In the good old days, it was Norton Commander, DosNavigator or PCTools - OBKenobi, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1There's actually a history of these "Commander" file managers, which the author calls "Orthodox File Managers." According to that, Norton was the original.
"The first OFM was written by John Socha in 1985-1986. He was the first director of research and development for now defunct Peter Norton Computing and the company released the first version of the product under the name of Norton Commander in 1986."
http://www.softpanorama.org/OFM/Paradigm/Ofm_01.shtml - salmonmoose, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1alt+space also = the window control menu. And if you don't know why you need that, you need to buy a second monitor :)
- RickyF, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1I have used Explorer alternatives since Windows 3. I would have used one with Windows 1 if any had existed.
My current favorite is explorer² professional, available at http://zabkat.com/.
It is not the easiest program to learn. It has a zillion features. Once used it becomes indispensable. It is always running on my machines. - HsoKinees, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1interesting review, dugg..
however.. I actually read it as "Explorer alternatives" .. is there a website that compares all the Explorer alternatives? - DarioInsane, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Directoy Opus! Nothing else! But you have to invest a little time to add shortcuts. The default configuration is for n00bs only.
- ubica, on 10/12/2007, -1/+1Directory Opus is worse then NT 4 ffs.
- llbbl, on 10/12/2007, -1/+1http://www.simplehelp.net/2006/10/11/10-windows-explorer-alternatives-compared-and-reviewed/#xplorer
xplorer seems like the best FREE one. almost all of the others had 30day trials. -
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