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Virtual Folder: Interesting tool at Bits du Jour today
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Posted by Alexander Deliyannis
Mar 14, 2009 at 02:03 PM
For people like me who like to have everything within reach no matter where it may be located, today’s Bits du Jour offers an interesting tool, Virtual Folder:
http://www.bitsdujour.com/software/virtual-folder/
Posted by Tom S.
Mar 14, 2009 at 05:10 PM
I guess I’m wondering what the difference is between this and simply creating a folder on my drive and droping a bunch of shortcuts into it?
Tom S..
Posted by VS
Mar 14, 2009 at 06:50 PM
Hello Alexander,
In fact, you can do the same in EverDesk too using the QuickBoard. Create as many QuickBoard tabs as you want and drag there any folders and files you want to have access to, regardless their original location.
When compared with Virtual Folder, EverDesk makes it possible to create more than one virtual storage and keep there not only folders, but single files too. Besides, when selecting a folder on the QuickBoard, you can immediately see its actual location in the folder tree on the left.
Regards,
Vladimir
Posted by Ken
Mar 14, 2009 at 07:46 PM
Tom S. wrote:
>I guess I’m wondering what the difference is between this and simply creating a folder
>on my drive and droping a bunch of shortcuts into it?
>
>Tom S..
I guess that I am with Tom on this one. I too do not see the difference between this program and using shortcuts.
—Ken
Posted by Alexander Deliyannis
Mar 15, 2009 at 04:10 PM
This little tool generated more comments at BdJ than I ever remember seeing in that site. The developer has been very open to suggestions, most of which were common sense, to the extent that I conclude that the program is still at an early stage of development, useful as it may be.
Re its usability, my main comment is that if one doesn’t find any difference between this and using a bunch of shortcuts, then for them there really isn’t one. Virtual Folder is indeed a rather specific (and idiosynchratic) solution to a problem that many may not have at all.
In my case, I rely rather too much on my desktop, drag-n-dropping the files on which I am working on to have at arm’s reach. This helps me focus, but I then need to remember to copy them back to their original locations if changed. At the same time, I often need to look to the related project files and keep those folders open as well. Last but not least, every now and then someone will call and interrupt my train of thought by asking for something completely different, I will navigate away and then will have to switch back to what I was doing.
So I personally was looking for something that would help me keep what I need on my workspace without too much fuss. Shortcuts are not an option because the files are simply too many. EverDesk’s quickboard is indeed an option but it’s attached to a mail client that I don’t need to keep open. Also, each work session is different so I don’t need any permanent connection.
Interestingly, I read of this idea of ‘virtual folders’ a few days ago, as a feature of the new KDE windows manager for Linux and felt rather jealous, as Windows are still my main operating system.