Path Finder is the uber-replacement for the Mac OS X Finder which has many features (and forethought) that the stock Finder could use. Even after its shiny metal facelift in Mac OS X 10.3, the Finder has felt very little in the way of new features or changes as of late, much like a cute puppy whose name you can't remember. My favorite features of Path Finder are its tabs, the drop stack, the integrated Terminal panel and the wicked Select tool. It can feel a bit foreign to switch from the Finder to something new, but if you are determined I bet you can make it through the 21-day free trial without much trouble. As Merlin Mann shows, you can either have as much "frippery" enabled as you want, or you can play it simple and straightforward. With WWDC just around the corner and Mac OS X Leopard details gently leaking around the Web, what do you Download Squad readers think would be a good addition to the Mac OS X Finder? What features, no matter how crazy you think they are, do you think would be a valuable addition? Or should it stay simple and sweet, leaving the talented third parties to take it to the next step?
[Via 43 Folders]
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
12-29-2006 @ 1:28PM
Shunnabunich said...
Definitely tabs, without a doubt. I also heard rumours long ago that the Finder was being rewritten from the ground up to be Spotlight-based, so I hope they've also been working on a new Spotlight that doesn't suck if that's true. Thing is, third-party developers are great to have, but on the other hand, do you want to tell your newly-switched fellow user they have to get several add-on utilities to add things like tabbed file browsing and decent search? I wouldn't want to see Apple completely rip off Path Finder, but I'd sure like the Finder to improve a bit.
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12-29-2006 @ 2:02PM
tickm said...
I have tried various iterations of pathfinder as they came out. It looks great in the screenshots, but i could not stand the way it handled the Desktop! I recall being really clunky and awful. And keeping Finder open just to draw the desktop kinda defeates the purpse :/
Here's hoping for a nice new Finder when the new Cat drops!
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