Why is tabbed Finder useful? I do not understand the purpose

Haha. I don't understand this either!

I guess we'll see and soon we won't be able to live without those bizarre tabs in finder!

Cheers 🙂

Fads, my friend, fads. Someone at Apple wanted to get on the "tab" bandwagon and now they're trying to put tabs everywhere. Even where it makes no sense at all and only complicates the user interface...

Same thing with tags: some people (Evernote, among others, is notable for refusing to allow more than two hierarchical levels) can't organize their documents in a hierarchical way. Using nested folders, etc.

They invented this "new" approach where you keep everything at the same hierarchical level, but add a (or several) flag to an item (file, folder) to make it a member of a "group".

Same thing with the "look" of OS X. There was the 3D epoch where the designers tended to make things stand out (icons, for example). Now, we're entering the "flat look" epoch...

Fads have a tendency to come and go. In a while, we'll go on to something else, dreamed up be the latest "designer" to work on something...

Bah...

I can't find a use for it, besides "neatness."

But, just about every Mac periodical and blog cringed at each previous OS being released without it, like it was the next great missing feature.

I have enjoyed the usefulness of tabs in finder when changing around system icons...being able to drag and drop easily from the same window into different tabs is a little less clutter-y than having multiple windows for finder open...know what I'm saying? It's handy in the same way that tabs on browsers are handy.

Its simply another organizational option for those who might find it useful. If you dont find it useful then you can ignore it and use the Finder as you always have, but if you see a use for it then you now have the option to take advantage of it. I enjoy using it to open a destination folder in one tab, and then navigate to a source folder in another, and then copy or move an item to the destination by dragging it to the tab, instead of having to manage this through separate Finder windows.

It's useful for some people. People purchased products like PathFinder and TotalFinder which provided tabbed folders (TotalFinder was basically a Finder "hack" to enable tabbed folders in Finder). So _some_ people find the feature useful.

I, personally, don't use tabbed folders very much. You may feel the same way - if you don't find a use for them you'll never notice they're even a feature 😉

Not as useful (for me) as the tabbed Terminal windows! 🙂

I contacted Apple about the Magic Mouse and Trackpad loosing the ability to swipe between Finder pages. The Senior Tech that they ended up elevating me to simply told me that they took the feature of swiping ,In The Finder with multi gesture devices, out of the OS and replaced it with the Finder tabs. Yes I know that this is obserd, and surely they told me this to try to resolve my issue but that is was they told me. I had to giggle.

Hopefully this is not true and as others have stated, if you cannot find a use for it then ignore and use Finder as you always have. Although if it is true that they took out Finder feature in favor of Tabs... Well then this will be a differnet story and a big disappointment.

FYI I like tabs to keep the clutter down as I use the Finder extensively.

I don't care for them either. I'd be happier if I could drag a window to the edge of the screen ahnd have it become a tab or drawer. Didn't we have that in some iteration of Classic? (The memory; she fades!)

Ravenmoon wrote:

I don't care for them either. I'd be happier if I could drag a window to the edge of the screen ahnd have it become a tab or drawer. Didn't we have that in some iteration of Classic? (The memory; she fades!)

That is why it good that we can choose to ignore them totally if we wish. They are not forced upon us. There were third party programs years back that would install 'Drawers' in the side of you screen, but I can never remember what they were called. Not that I want them. They are probably still available in some form of third party hack.

Cheers

Pete

"DragThing". Not a hack, a regular app.

I still use it. Since longer than I can recall! Regularly updated and works well. Inexpensive, but its use is reducing as I now use "Launchbar" much more often...

Regards.

It installs itself into the OS dock and finder and is not a hack?

Pete

It's a hack, but it may be a well written one.

Exactly. I don't think because something hacks into the OS is it not written carefully in doing so. Most, unfortunately, give a bad name to the few that are seemingly harmless (or less harmless) to use. Most of us have installed something that hacks the OSX at one time or another.

Cheers

Pete