GNOME Bugzilla – Bug 683802
View mode setting should persistent for each directory
Last modified: 2021-06-18 15:55:49 UTC
In nautilus 3.5.91, the view mode setting is global, not stored for each directory. I miss the previous ability to have this particular setting per view, as I tend to prefer the icon mode for all my directories, except for "download" and "recent", where I find an icon view makes more useful.
Persistent View mode setting for each directory is very important feature for file manager.
*** Bug 686499 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
Can you please consider the wished behavior? I expected to have this feature in the GNOME 3.8 release but it wasn't there. Changing the view for each folder is just painful. For my download folder I want a list view and for my photos folder I want minature pictures, why would anyone change the view manually all the time?
Confirming, I experience the annoyance daily.
Is this ever returning?
*** Bug 727792 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
+1 for providing an option for per-folder settings!
+1 providing option for per-folder settings It is very annoying to change view settings many times a day and every day...
+1 providing option for per-folder settings This "bug" is driving me (and probably many more) away from nautilus. See also: https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/nautilus/+bug/1152226. We would really appreciate any action on this, either restore the old settings or at least an option for per-folder settings (including sorting of the columns). Thanks!
when i'm browsing my work documents in list view (because there are hundreds of folders) and open a new window/tab with photos which I want to see thumbnails for, I change the photo folder to icon view to select the correct photo to copy it to one of my work folders - but the list of my work folders also changes to icons!! so I have to click the menu icon, change back to a nice readable list of folders, to see/sort by column information, and than go back to my photo window and not being able to distinguish between the photos I have to open the popover again and change to icon view, and again and again. Arrrrgghhh! doesn't really make my workflow fast :( even more, when I change the icon size to bigger - my desktop icons change too making some of them to disappear out of the desktop area! this is a very annoying bug. I really hope we don't have to wait half year now for this to be fixed in the next release and get it in one of the maintenance releases. please, make nautilus remember the view setting on per folder basis. In the past, I was hoping to set a color/shade on the backgrounds of some folders(its contents) for easier recognition, but this seems even more impossible now when global view setting rules. p.s.: I had customers laughing at my OS seeing me working so cumbersome with their files in my office :(
+1 for this! It is very useful to be able to have photo folders as icons and document folders as lists by default instead of having to open multiple windows or change the setting after navigating to a new folder. Please consider making this an option together with remembering the sort order on a folder basis (e.g. Downloads could be sorted after date while Home could sorted alphabetically).
I just learnt that the sort order is actually remembered per directory already and that one can use Ctrl+1 and Ctrl+2 to quickly toggle between the list and icon view. This largely ameliorates the lack of folder level persistent view settings, although that would still be a more sensible default in my opinion.
It is great to see the sort settings being remembered per directory already, however this is not necessarily apparent when in icon view. It would be really great if all view settings would be remembered consistently per directory — otherwise there is just anxiety if the order is right or not.
(In reply to coreboc from comment #10) > when i'm browsing my work documents in list view (because there are hundreds > of folders) and open a new window/tab with photos which I want to see > thumbnails for, I change the photo folder to icon view to select the correct > photo to copy it to one of my work folders - but the list of my work folders > also changes to icons!! so I have to click the menu icon, change back to a > nice readable list of folders, to see/sort by column information, and than > go back to my photo window and not being able to distinguish between the > photos This shouldn't happen, the setting is only applied to the current view and the new ones
I would actually like the sort setting not remember per directory except for those that makes sense like Downloads in modified time. It's pretty confusing to me when I change the location and then suddenly the sorting is different :/ I did not change it...why does it change on my back? That makes me think I'm not sure Downloads folder should be an exception either.
There are different needs for different mental models. Some people see Nautilus as the object that has to stay persistent: if I don't change a setting, why does Nautilus change? Other people see the file system as persistent: if I didn't change that folder, why does it look different from last time I encountered it? I'm in the latter camp. I have lots of files, but only one file manager, so I believe the files are the objects that should behave persistently. The file manager should be transparent, the files are the things I am working with, not the "app". Anyway, it would be great to accommodate both approaches.
That's an interesting point of view. Would be great to find what other file managers do, and what solutions we could have for both.
Some file managers that save view options per directory: - Finder (from MacOS 1 on) - Explorer (from Win95 on) at least attempts to save view options and features a clumsy "reset for all folders" button :) - Nemo (Nautilus fork) - Nautilus (before Gnome Shell) - Dolphin (KDE) - Workbench (Amiga classic) Some file managers that save view options application-wide: - Norton Commander (MS-DOS) - GEM Desktop (MS-DOS, Atari) - Midnight Commander - File Manager (Windows 1.0 to 3.11) - Nextcloud/OwnCloud (cloud storage) - Google Drive (cloud storage) I guess a single checkbox in prefenrences like "remember view settings per directory" would be nice. If it changes its status from checked to unchecked, all view metadata could be erased. Of course Gnome tries to avoid exposing settings whenever possible (and I like that), but this I think would justify one. MacOS' Finder is an interesting hybrid as it features the Miller Columns view that very much appeals to "list/app people" and the icon view that "location/object people" seem to like. KDE's dolphin used to have Miller Columns, but they were dropped for some reason in a relatively recent version.
Perfect, thanks a lot for the investigation
I will make some decision for 3.24, so marking the bug for it.
> I guess a single checkbox in preferences like "remember view settings per > directory" would be nice. If it changes its status from checked to > unchecked, all view metadata could be erased. This would be great. If this bug is fixed, I can consider to return to nautilus. Thanks for looking into this!
A checkbox or similar feature in the options menu sound great! Thanks for investigating this for 3.24!
I like nautilus very much and I agree with what has already been said. I also find this feature very useful and it's too bad it doesn't exist on nautilus.
I would still love to see something happen here. Why can this crucial feature not be resurrected? :O It does not need to be set by default but at least having the option to have Nautilus remember the view per directory would be great. This is probably the only reason I don't use Nautilus and I would like to return but cannot because of this annoying bug. Thanks for listening and hopefully somebody can have pity on us and work on this. Thanks in advance!
Hello everybody! Could this long time request (since 2012!) be worked on? PLEASE! Many would be delighted, a newer bug report was filed (https://gitlab.gnome.org/GNOME/nautilus/issues/58) and linked with this one a year ago. But still no progress. I plead to people who can program it. This is the main problem for me (and probably others) to switch back to Nautilus. Thanks in advance!
Please avoid nagging comments. It wastes people's time and has the opposite effect of your intention: making people unsubscribe to avoid the spam. By the way, this doesn't need people who can program (it was already programmed in the past). The hard part are is interaction design (this has been changed in the past for a reason).
Thank you, @António, for your comment! Sorry if I have caused any annoyance, this was surely not my intention. I rather wanted to encourage people to work on this. I am just desperate about the current situation. What would you suggest to increase the likelihood that this 7-year-old-"bug" could be fixed? Who could help with the interaction design? I want to apologise again for any irritation I may have caused.
See pending MR for this: https://gitlab.gnome.org/GNOME/nautilus/-/merge_requests/478
GNOME is going to shut down bugzilla.gnome.org in favor of gitlab.gnome.org. As part of that, we are mass-closing older open tickets in bugzilla.gnome.org (resources are unfortunately quite limited so not every ticket can get handled). If you can still reproduce the situation described in this ticket in a recent and supported software version of Files (nautilus), then please follow https://wiki.gnome.org/GettingInTouch/BugReportingGuidelines and create a new ticket at https://gitlab.gnome.org/GNOME/nautilus/-/issues/ Thank you for your understanding and your help.