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Better Software for Apple Mac osx

The Main Dialog

The main dialog of A Better Finder Attributes 4 is subdivided into a number of distinct areas:

The Action: popup menu allows you specify which action will be applied.

As soon as you select an action its parameters will be displayed below it in the dialog. In the screenshot above the parameters are "Date" and "Time" and the "Change the modification date of the file(s)" action has been selected.

Clicking on the "Options" disclosure triangle will reveal the "Show Summary after processing is complete" checkbox. When this option is ticked, the program will display a summary indicating, how many files have been successfully processed, which error conditions were encountered, etc.

At the bottom of the dialog you will find a number of buttons.

The OK button applies the currently selected action and parameters to the selected files and closes the application. Press the return key or click on the button to process the selected files.

The Apply button applies the currently selected action without quitting the application.

The Cancel button leaves the application without processing the files You can press the Esc key instead of clicking the button.

The Create Droplet... button allows you to save the current settings to a droplet application.

The File Drawer

To the right of the main dialog, you see the "file drawer".

This shows the file attributes that are relevant to the currently selected action for each selected file.

You can switch the "Path" column on and off in the menus. The displayed columns will change according to which action is selected.

At the bottom of the preview window are three checkboxes, which allow you to process files and folders separately and to include or exclude files and folders in sub-folders.

  • files All the selected files will be processed. This setting does not affect the selected folders!
  • folders All the selected folders will be processed. This setting does not affect the selected files.
  • subfolders and their contents A Better Finder Attributes will process not only the selected files or folders, but will also the files and folders inside of all of the selected folders. In other words it will process everything within the folder hierarchy of the selected folders.

The settings of the three check boxes can be combined. Ticking all three check boxes, for instance, means that all files and folders inside of the file hierarchy of all selected folders will be processed. Unticking the folder check box will mean that only the files inside of the folder hierarchy will be processed, etc..

Clicking on the paperclip icon at the bottom left of the file drawer allows you to detach the file list drawer and presents the file list in a separate, re sizable window.

This may be more convenient for working with files with long file names. The separate file list window can be docked onto the left-hand side of the main dialog and will then move together with it.