Big Sur - New/Open/Save dialog box -size won't save

Agree - Update .2 fixed the window size .... NOW, can someone ping Apple about fixing the TINY FILE NAME FIELD ... it remains it's tiny fixed size and is so small that it's useless (if you use canonical file names that need to be longer)... have to scroll around in the itty-bitty field just to read it or get to the end of the filename.

How about a % of the windows width? If we want our window larger, it would stand to reason that we want the fields larger, too. responsive UX here seems like a good (up-do-date) concept!

OK, we might be talking about two different things. I'm, referring to the left side of the 'open/save/save as' dialog box, where the Favorites are listed. . You can't increase the width of it until you increase the size of the entire dialog box by dragging one of the corners.

You can then increase the width, enabling viewing of the entire folder name. To do that, hover the cursor over the vertical line just to the right of the folder names.

True, sorry about the misunderstanding.

However, here's a bit of a workaround: With your cursor in the name field, if you hold down the Option key and then click the left or right arrow button, the cursor will jump to the end of each word, making it easier to see and edit the full file name. (And the Command/arrow combo will move the cursor to the beginning or end of the file name.)

Hope that helps.

Nope! I just updated to macOS Big Sur 11.2.1 and it's only partially fixed.

In the Save As dialog I noticed that while it now continuously retains the resizing of the main right-hand window pane (folder and file list), the Sidebar window (locations, favourites, tags...) reverts back to the extremely annoying small default size on any subsequent occasion when no resizing of the Sidebar has since been made.

For instance, every time I resize the width of Sidebar window in the Save As dialog and then exit the dialog (using Cancel or Save), it will retain the new width size on the very next occasion the Save As dialog is launched - giving the impression the bug has been fixed! But... if I exit the dialog as is without making any further resize changes to the Sidebar window it then reverts back to the small default size on the very next occasion.

I actually can't believe Apple with their top-quality software developers manages to get this half-baked fix pass quality control before the update is deployed.

I’m glad you have flagged this. Thought I was going mad trying to recreate this issue but didn’t seem to happen every time. I can’t believe something so fundamental to finder is still broken.

Was really hoping 11.2.1 would fix this but guess we still have to wait.

I know, right!?! It's as if the Apple software developer that was assigned to fix it made a code change, then quickly tried it out (just the once!) and thought "Right, that's fixed!" and moved onto the next task.

I was being sarcastic. I'm really irritated that I spent $6500 on a new laptop with several major usability flaws that significantly impact my already overloaded workday. I will however take your advice and take a breath next time. Please don't respond I really don't have time for this BS.

Also, why is my cursor not by default in the filename text box of the save-as dialogue? I need to hit TAB four times to get it there. These are simple things, but as soon as they get screwed up in the UI you realise how important they are.

System reliability is out the window now.

I quit Chrome - which requires prolonged holding down Command+Q [breaking from the base OS but there you have it] and with Safari behind this, Safari got caught in the long hold-down and it too Quit.

No problem I think to myself. I "restart" Safari. It bounces and bounces and bounces... continues to bounce, doesn't open. Now I cannot even click the icon - it is dimmed. It beeps back at me.

This is a relatively new MacBookPro [late-2018 purchased early 2019] with lots of RAM [32GB] and is acting like a 1.6GHz with 4GB of RAM... completely unacceptable.

And Mail is still crap - the prefs window is stuck in 2004 - cannot make it wider to see the email account names, all I see is andrew@... and with several emails that start with this, Mail is useless to me.

And FontBook still cannot disable all of the craptastic garbage fonts I do not need - I cannot have 30 trillion junk fonts with absolutely no purpose whatsoever clogging my design apps. This is greatly affecting my ability to work on a Mac.

Any other apps anyone having problems with STILL under Big Sur?

TextEdit was always crashing when I highlighted various blocks of differently-formatted text to copy or cut it to place elsewhere. Not sure if this bug is continuing.

Submitting bug reports is NOT WORKING. I have submitted these bug reports over and over again since last November - the start of the Big Sur heck [they won't let me say the other word] that I am currently going through.

Oh, just remembered another one... when taking a screen shot, the image opens in Preview which is great, then Preview presents you with the Open dialogue box. Why? I want to save the screen shot I just took - why on earth would Apple erroneously program Preview to make the user open a file?

Oh... and... and... I got a million of them... Mail has a new checkbox when saving a message, it reads quite clearly "Include Attachments" This is ON by default. It NEVER saves the attachments. I can save the text, but with dozens of emails daily from clients sending work and sending revisions, would really love it if this apparent "feature" actually worked as intended. It does not.

Is this just Catalina through Bug Sur bugs - has Apple outsourced its development?

Anyone?

so 11.2.2 is out, I've installed it. Size of sidebar is still broken FFS. If you select open/save/new it comes up too narrow, resize it, close it, open again and it appears fixed, but close that and open again and it reverts back to the tiny size.

I've ended up buying Default Folder X, purely because the developer has added a fix for the Apple issue to keep the sidebar fixed after resizing. Yes it works, but why should have to buy additional software to bodge Apples awful bug checking. And yes I have reported the issue to Apple in 11.2, 11.2.1 and now 11.2.2!

j4m1eb wrote:

I've ended up buying Default Folder X, purely because the developer has added a fix for the Apple issue to keep the sidebar fixed after resizing.

Thank you for the tip with Default Folder X, j4m1eb. I installed it right away and the open/save sidebar is indeed fixed! I never thought I'd be that happy about such a basic feature...

You are correct. We shouldn't have to buy additional software to get around some stupid and unnecessary bugs in the most basic parts of Apple's operating system. But Default Folder X does introduce a few pretty useful and time-saving features. So I consider it worth the money.

Still...

I have to say, I feel and agree to what you are talking about. I bought this most expensive €5000+ Macbook Pro and it is the most unreliable I ever had. Crashes for the first 4 months every day. Multiple. Now those are gone after a few software updates, but still not happy, to b ehonest. Despite the software (aka OS) issues, this powerful machine starts spinning the fans on turbo as soon as I enter a video chat and alike. This is ridiculous and does not feel good. And I am using Apple since more than 25 years now. First machine I am not really happy with (the last one I had and still have isa Macbook Pro mid 2014).

I’m glad you’re confident that it will be fixed because this has been an issue since December and 11.1. Now we are on 11.2.3. A large update and many minor and still missed. This bug effects me daily in my job and has been reported for over 3 months.

it’s incredibly frustrating how long this is taking.

The same happens to me. Now I'm running 11.2.3 and still, the dialog box/folder cannot remember the size. Every time I open the folder, I have to re-size it because it's default size is too small. Driving me mad.