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Library tutorial needed

I am currently running Snow Leopard, and thinking about upgrading to Mountain Lion. I am not interested in iCloud and such, I personally consider anything on the cloud, supported by anyone, to be a potential security risk for my personal information. As a result, my onlne banking is as minimal as it gets, and I have a Drobpox account. That's the extent of my cloud/online activity.


Those improved features do not interest me. I do like the Dictation idea, and wish I had a way to test it out in the apps I currently use. Most are non-Apple apps. Generally, they are Open Source.


With Windows 7, MS introduces user libraries for accessing data. I am not referring to libraries of program code, or Library folders on the Mac where application support files are stored. The user libraries allow the user to essentially create a shortcut to folders spread across your hard drive(s), for quicker access. You can see these libraries listed in the Navigation Pane of a Windows Explorer window, assuming the user has not chosen to hide those libraries.


Smart Folders are not the same thing. Vista had them also, but they were dropped in favor of Libraries.


Does Mountain Lion have a similar feature? If so, where can I find a good tutorial/article on using them? My search terms have found me nothing. ๐Ÿ˜Ÿ

iMac - Intel based, Mac OS X (10.6.8), 4 GB RAM, 1 TB hard drive

Posted on Nov 10, 2012 12:35 PM

Reply
33 replies

Nov 10, 2012 12:44 PM in response to snowshed

Currently, OS X does not have a way to link different folders across drives. Mountain Lion operates functionally like Snow Leopard. It has Smart Folders, aliases, Unix aliase, but no mechanism for setting up an alias that points to more than one source.


I'm not quite sure if this is what your question intended because it is unclear if you are just asking about a basic alias. Of course what you are asking about is also not present in Snow Leopard, so I'm puzzled as to why this matters in upgrading to Mountain Lion.

Nov 10, 2012 3:19 PM in response to Kappy

Hi, Kappy,

Kappy wrote:


Currently, OS X does not have a way to link different folders across drives. Mountain Lion operates functionally like Snow Leopard. It has Smart Folders, aliases, Unix aliase, but no mechanism for setting up an alias that points to more than one source.

That's a bummer. ๐Ÿ˜Ÿ That would/could be such a useful feature if implemented at the OS level, as Windows has tried, pititfully, to do.

I'm not quite sure if this is what your question intended because it is unclear if you are just asking about a basic alias. Of course what you are asking about is also not present in Snow Leopard, so I'm puzzled as to why this matters in upgrading to Mountain Lion.

That is the question I intended. With aliases and folders, you could do almost what I want. Same is true for Windows.


It matters, re: upgrading, in determining if there is enough new features that interest me in ML to make it worthwhile. Since I'm not a social network/media user, from the list of new and improved features on http://www.apple.com/osx/specs/ Dictation seems to be the only thing that looks interesting to me. If the ability to link better than Win7 has done was there, I would upgrade. But that alone is not worth the time and effort.


I never even bothered with a MobileMe account. It had no value to me. ๐Ÿ˜‰


This is what I would like to be able to do...


I have 4 folders, A, B, C, and D. In each folder are 10 files, 01.xxx, 02.xxx, ..., 10.xxx.


I create 2 libraries, Odd and Even. When I open the Odd library, I would like to see the odd numbered files from all 4 folders. Just the files, not a folders. In the Even library, I want to see all the even numbered files. That's pretty much it.


If you know of some app that does this, I'd be interested in knowing what it is. I've not found oneyet for Windows that will do this.


George Bernard Shaw said:


โ€œReasonable people adapt themselves to the world. Unreasonable people attempt to adapt the world to themselves. All progress, therefore, depends on unreasonable people.โ€


And


โ€œYou see things; and you say, 'Why?' But I dream things that never were; and I say, 'Why not?'โ€


That's where I've always been with computers, wanting things they couldn't yet do, and why I liked the Atari platform far better than DOS/Windows and Mac. What I wanted to do, if not part of the OS, was usually/eventually available because some programmer also wanted it. So 3rd party apps were written, I could do on the computer the things I wanted.

Nov 10, 2012 6:45 PM in response to Kappy

Hi, Kappy,

Why not? That was Apple's decision. Very few if any users ever need the feature. It is convenient for specialized needs, but not a feature in very high demand.

And my perennial question is, how do they know users wouldn't use it?


Basing a decision like this on user feedback has a drawback/loophole, if that's what they did. Users won't request it if they know nothing relating to using a computer. Or, don't ever think there might be an easier or quicker way to solve a problem. ๐Ÿ˜Ÿ


I'm basically lazy! ๐Ÿ˜€ I'm always looking for, and trying to think of, an easier and quicker way to do things.

Nov 10, 2012 6:58 PM in response to snowshed

In my 24 years of using Apple operating systems which includes every version of OS X, I have never seen a request for this feature until yours. Most users of Windows or OS X don't even know what Unix is. That particular feature is not "native" even to Unix. I've only seen it in third-party shell implementations for Linux. I doubt Apple had any such feedback about the feature, and unless there were a lot more than one they would not pay attention to it.


Perhaps there is another way of solving your problem that doesn't require the feature. I'm wondering if the reason you haven't found anything may be because the time and effort is more costly to you than the benefits. ๐Ÿ™‚ If it were a deal-breaker then you'd be running Linux and a shell that offered the feature (if there even is one anymore.) I haven't seen it since I used an Amiga.

Nov 10, 2012 7:14 PM in response to snowshed

snowshed wrote:


Smart Folders are not the same thing.

Why not? It is a bit unfair to ask for a feature and make a point of disallowing the equivalent feature.


Mountain Lion is moving towards an iOS-style apps interface. If you use iCloud (which you have also disallowed), all of your documents are only available in the application that creates them. Instead user-created directory trees, you use Spotlight to find files. In fact, you can only create directories one level deep in iCloud.

Nov 10, 2012 7:29 PM in response to Kappy

Kappy wrote:


In my 24 years of using Apple operating systems which includes every version of OS X, I have never seen a request for this feature until yours. Most users of Windows or OS X don't even know what Unix is. That particular feature is not "native" even to Unix. I've only seen it in third-party shell implementations for Linux. I doubt Apple had any such feedback about the feature, and unless there were a lot more than one they would not pay attention to it.

I have a hunch, all too often a user doesn't even know what the operating system is. ๐Ÿ˜Ÿ


But what is "native" to an operating system? Are native features only those in an OS 20+ years ago? OS's evolve like everything else, why shouldn't this feature be included in an OS and become native? How many times have you seen a utility written for an OS, then seen that ability added to the next version of that OS?


I only thought of it after creating my first Keynote presentation, followed by cleaning up a Win7 computer and having to figure out what Libraries did. I had to do the presentation as a PowerPoint file, due to the equipment available for the presentation.


Had this feature been available, I'd would have had the presentation completed in a lot less time.

Perhaps there is another way of solving your problem that doesn't require the feature. I'm wondering if the reason you haven't found anything may be because the time and effort is more costly to you than the benefits. ๐Ÿ™‚ If it were a deal-breaker then you'd be running Linux and a shell that offered the feature (if there even is one anymore.) I haven't seen it since I used an Amiga.

I've been looking for both Windows and OS X utilities for this. And in more than one place. Because the Win7 computer is going to be donated to a social agency, looking for a Windows solution has been the priority. And I've only been looking for less than a week. So far, a goose egg, but others have seen the value of it. And I do have other things to do besides surf and search. ๐Ÿ˜€


Trying out Linux is on my list, just no time to pursue that. ๐Ÿ˜Ÿ

Nov 10, 2012 7:37 PM in response to snowshed

"Native" means the feature is included in the OS implementation whatever the time period of the implementation.


How many times have you seen a utility written for an OS, then seen that ability added to the next version of that OS?


Actually, rarely. More often someone writes a third-party utility to provide a feature not included in the OS, not the other way around.


Let me warn you that although I have seen the feature in a shell add-on to Linux, the feature is not native in Linux, either. I'm no longer a Windows user, but that feature wasn't even part of DOS as I recall.

Nov 10, 2012 7:43 PM in response to etresoft

A Smart Folder is not the same thing. The OP is talking about having an alias that points to two or more folders that become like a single folder to the user. For example, an Applications folder at the root and also in the Home folder. We then create an alias, Applications, that displays the content of both separate folders as a single folder. This would be essentially an extensions of the basic Unix soft link.


Smart Folders can behave somewhat like the above, but it is just a display of a set of search results. This is not the same thing.

Nov 10, 2012 8:10 PM in response to etresoft

etresoft wrote:


snowshed wrote:


Smart Folders are not the same thing.

Why not? It is a bit unfair to ask for a feature and make a point of disallowing the equivalent feature.

When I first started looking at doing what I want, I checked out Smart Folders, as suggested by a poster in the Snow Leopard forum.


I've just read Kappy's reply to you post, and he (assumed "he", no offense intended if that's wrong ๐Ÿ™‚ ) seems to have a handle on it.


Here's a screenshot of a spotlight search for JPG on one of my external drives.


User uploaded file

Can you devise a Spotlight search that will select every 4th file? What if the files I wanted in the folder was the 1st, 9th, 13th, and 28th? What if the files I want in the folder are spread across different partitions and drives?


If you've stopped to think about it, I want a folder that mimics the card file at your library. As simple as that. ๐Ÿ™‚

Mountain Lion is moving towards an iOS-style apps interface. If you use iCloud (which you have also disallowed), all of your documents are only available in the application that creates them. Instead user-created directory trees, you use Spotlight to find files. In fact, you can only create directories one level deep in iCloud.

I know. ๐Ÿ˜Ÿ Moving on to being able to do less with something in the iCloud, instead of doing more. By "more", accomplishing different and undone things, not just moving the results to a different location.


If you look back at history, and compare the cloud to computers 40 years ago, you're actually turning your devices, like the iPad, iPhone, Android powered equipment, into the modern day equivalent of the dumb terminal of 40 years ago. Where you only do what Apple or the IT guys of 40 years ago said you can do.


If that's the way it continues to go, I've bought my one and only Apple. Except for the selection at the grocery store! ๐Ÿ˜

Nov 10, 2012 8:23 PM in response to Kappy

Kappy wrote:



just no time to pursue that.



I think that if your time is more valuable from what you do rather than how you do it, then you need to hire a programmer to handle all this. Sounds like you are the $100 an hour expert who is doing a $25 an hour job. Not an effective use of one's time. ๐Ÿ˜€

No, I'm the retired guy who has more things on the to do list and the wish list than he has time (and money!) for. ๐Ÿ˜

Nov 10, 2012 8:30 PM in response to etresoft

I agree its functionally similar, but not the same. A Smart Folder cannot sit in your root as an Applications folder that looks like one as opposed to looking like an alias.


I know you are familar with Unix. Have you seen the implementation in a Unix or Linux shell? I have not seen it implemented in recent times. I'm not even sure it was even a design philosophy for Apple because it did not exist in any version of OS X. Mac OS was not built on Unix like OS X was.

Nov 10, 2012 8:35 PM in response to Kappy

Kappy wrote:

How many times have you seen a utility written for an OS, then seen that ability added to the next version of that OS?

Actually, rarely. More often someone writes a third-party utility to provide a feature not included in the OS, not the other way around.

We're talking the same thing, here. ๐Ÿ˜‰

Let me warn you that although I have seen the feature in a shell add-on to Linux, the feature is not native in Linux, either. I'm no longer a Windows user, but that feature wasn't even part of DOS as I recall.

I've never seen what I'm looking for either. ๐Ÿ˜Ÿ But, you've got to ask and look. Maybe some enterprising or budding programmer will read this discussion, and presto chango, a new ability is added to an OS. Especially if they did it as a cross platform project.


Would you even be able to do this in DOS? For my purpose in real life, a command line interface wouldn't work. You'd need a graphical interface to see exactly what you'd be selecting from the library, unless you have oodles of time.

Library tutorial needed

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