Mavericks Finder - how default to "double click opens new window"?

Barney-15E wrote:

"healthy" discussion and "voicing of opinions" have rarely anything to do with constructive feedback.

More often than not it is just whining and complaining.

so true. Sometimes though it's good to here others share the same problem or have a similar one, but focus must lie on creating constructive feedback – the word of the day. Hope we all can draw from that.

More often than not it is just whining and complaining.

It does work at times, though. "The squeaky wheel gets the grease." 🙂 Complaining can be good, but it needs to be done constructively with reasoned responses and why you feel it should be changed, or at least be made a user option.

Like this very long topic on the loss of Save As in Lion I was deeply entrenched with. There were quite a few others with users vehemently demanding Apple put it back. But it wasn't just here. In a couple of those topics, users noted they also called Apple to complain about the change and said that the person they had on the line said, "Yes, we've heard this complaint many, many times".

For what it's worth, Mavericks is behaving no differently than any version of OS X from at least Snow Leopard forward. With the sidebar open, double clicking a subfolder has always caused the new folder to open within the same folder. So nothing "changed" in Mavericks as far as folder behavior goes.

That doesn't in any way mean I don't agree with the premise. Why doesn't it? Or why can you at least not have an option for it? Windows defaults to the same behavior, but a simple change to the settings allows you to open all folders in new windows without having to collapse the surrounding navigation elements. There's no logical reason Apple couldn't offer the same simple setting.

But this just isn't true. The defaults are the same, but until Mavericks the user always had the option to revert to the prior folder behavior. Mavericks removed an optional user setting that (apparently) many users were employing.

Oh for crimminy's sake! Sorry, while it may seem like it, I'm not trying to be a weenie. I just haven't been paying close enough attention. I've despised the entire sidebar and toolbar thing since its inception and simply won't use it. Waste of screen real estate that duplicates other functions. Every folder I use regularly I collapse to an OS 9 type of folder in List view.

Apple swapped out the old Finder preference of "Always open folders in a new window" with "Open folders in tabs instead of new windows". Nothing you don't already know.

So, like the Save As debacle in Lion, someone, or a group of programmers at Apple decided for themselves that "No one needs this." Sure, let's not ask the users if they agree, or make it a switchable option.

I went back to Snow Leopard to see where this option was stored. By clicking the Finder window option on and off, the state is saved in the user account preference file com.apple.finder.plist as the key:

<key>FinderSpawnWindow</key>

<true/>

"False" if you've got it off.

You can get this key into the preferences by opening Terminal and entering…

defaults write com.apple.finder FinderSpawnWindow -bool true

…but Mavericks ignores the key. Even if you restart, or quit the Finder to force it into reading and loading the preferences again.

Thanks for the link. I too have filed a complaint - completely baffling loss of functionality for, so far as I can see, no gain whatever. After the iOS7 debacle I am beginning to wonder if Apple employ anyone in a design capacity who is over 25.

Its not just Apple, I am seeing the same problem wide spread. I have been doing Graphic/Web design for over 25 years on Mac-only and have over 100 repeat corporate clients. Most of the companies I deal with apparently run little more than a "jobs" program. These new employees (mostly kids with a piece of paper as evidence that they were indoctrinated) have to impress the boss to keep their job - so every week they have to make it look like they have done something. In this case, someone conciously changed the Option Key modifier to the Command Key modifier for absolutly no reason (there can be no justification for that). Then they went on to reverse the Default behavior... why (nothing gained but confusion).

I have made a 6-figure income for many years with the Mac OS and "professionals" that make their living with a Mac get in to a routine to where you play the keyboard very much like playing chords on a piano with their left hand. These finder keyboard and default changes are the equivalent changing the finger position for chords on a guitar after you are an accomplished musician. Someone(s) kept a job or got a promotion over making these bird-brain decisions when they should have been fired, but you can't just pay people to sit there and do nothing as they are hired to fix something that isn't broken under the guise of making an improvement!

Bottom line is the new people in charge simply lack "experience", so we all have to suffer from their incompetence. Again, not just Apple - I am seeing this in almost every Company (including the Government), and I don't see it improving in my lifetime.

All the defenders say in defense, is "un-install" and go back to what you like. The question is what consumer was complaining about having to use the Option Key instead of the Command Key in the first place? Not one. A "upgrade" should add or improve functionality, not just jumble things up for the **** of it.

100%

+1

Like

Etc...

Apple needs to revert this BS. Bring back the old way of using the finder!

wakazashi wrote:

100%

+1

Like

Etc...

Apple needs to revert this BS. Bring back the old way of using the finder!

FEEDBACK http://www.apple.com/feedback/macosx.html

Pete

Hold option and double click on the folder and it will open it in a new window.

Hope that helps!

Yes, pretty much everyone already knows that. It has been mentioned numerous times in this topic.

The complaint is that before Mavericks, you didn't have to hold a modifier key to open a nested folder when the sidebar and/or toolbar is active.

If you hold down OPTION and Double-Click, it does "appear" to launch a new window (rather than just repopulate the already opoen window), but the only difference I see in using the OPTION key is that you lose the "Back" button in the upper left of the new window - not sure why anyone would want to do that???

FootFun wrote:

Hold option and double click on the folder and it will open it in a new window.

Hope that helps!

Yes... but the original window that was open disappears... the previous behaviour was one that allowed the windows to remain open and allowed what I described as 'organic' navigation.
All of the changes have resulted in linear navigation being the only way of handling your files. Unless of course you go the route of hiding the toolbar (and therefore massively reducing functionality) and you apply that change to every folder one-by-one.

That's the classic behavior!

Classic behavior:

Double click: Open folder in new window

Option-Double click: Open folder in new window, closing the previous one

Why did Apple get rid of the first behavior but still kept the second?

Stupid!