I use a tagging system with XYplorer
Give a few descriptive tags to every file as you go and you've got a working library that's faster/easier than folders - best software I've ever used.
Par dana koristim već XYplorer umesto File Explorera u Windows-u. Prednosti koje sam ja našao:
Sve u svemu super iskustvo. Pitanje za one koji koriste third-party file manager, za šta ga koriste i koje su neke super mogućnosti koje mogu da zatrebaju drugima?
Boy have you been missing out! :D
This one at least has a relatively nice and non-geeky website: https://www.xyplorer.com/
Screenshots and feature grid: https://www.xyplorer.com/product.php#shots
I once bookmarked this long article that describes 3rd party file tagging programs.
And here are some of the productive things XYplorer can do with files and folder via tags, embedded comments, grouping, color coding and searches.
That's on top of supporting multiple tabs that can reside on multiple windows. It's amazing how so many other useful XYplorer features can exist when Windows File Explorer has few of those features.
XYplorer even supports "Paper Folders" that let you put the names of files into a text file so that a Paper folder looks and functions like a real folder even if image files reside in that text file. That's another way to group related files and folders. Such a text-based folder could probably live in an Obsidian page. One day I'll look into that.
You can batch rename using creation date with xyplorer. Here's how: https://www.xyplorer.com/xyfc/viewtopic.php?t=8953
There's a 30 day free trial
So I found a solution, more or less: since I already use the EXCELLENT XYplorer, I found out it can use the Windows built-in iFilter (if you enable it in windows -> indexing o.c.) to search through contents of several pdfs in all folders.
I'm in no way associated with XYplorer, but seriously, I love it, go check it out! https://www.xyplorer.com/
You'll need the paid version to do it, but XYplorer might meet the need. Supports tags and -- the important bit -- allows you so sort images by their hashes, which usually means that similar looking images are sorted together. Add a thumbnail plus details view and I suspect you've got most or all of what you need.
See https://www.xyplorer.com/release_20.80.php#ImageDupes for detail.
I just found the answer to my own question.
XYplorer Free has an amazing feature called MiniTree which allows just what I want (hide anything not relevant to me)
I just switched to a third party File manager and haven’t looked back. XyPlorer is has tabs, customizable hotkeys, you can easily remove or add anything you want to your favorites sidebar, in any order you want. No more stupid 3D objects forever taking up apace unless I go into the registry editor to remove it.
Dual panes for those that are into that, and an endless amount of other features. Fuck windows explorer and it’s limitations.
I would not say most people install so much junk on there computer that they forget the name of the program they want to start, that's a bit silly to think and even if you do a folder for those portable programs is just one icon on the desktop.
I like my computers super clean but that's not for everybody i know there are people that don't care (like the op in this post clearly) how their desktop look.
Maybe check out Xyplorer? (https://www.xyplorer.com/) i use that on my windows machine heavily modded though (icons borders scripts etc) i have all my programs linked to that program and start them from Xyplorer itself to get rid of search and icons works great for work as well you have everything you need if you take time to customize it.
I've used quite a few of them over the years and I'm very picky about which features I want and overall customization. The one I would personally recommend is xyplorer. Hands down impressive in both regards.
Tried it. I much prefer XYplorer. It's crammed with powerful features (including caching folder sizes) and Donald Lessau (the developer) is active and friendly. The lifetime license sometimes goes on sale for 50% off on Bitsdujour.
I use XYPlorer for it, but would be nice having it in windows. Although XYPlorer is just insanely complete, probably hard to find a better file manager, but it someone has suggestions I'm curious.
I don't like how little windows explorer has evolved last decades due to productivity for power users. I use macOS, Gnome and KDE and really miss some of their basic features in windows explorer.
That being said, I've been experimenting with https://www.xyplorer.com/
lately and it's promising.
If you use the File Explorer even somewhat intensively, I cannot recommend XYplorer enough. They have a free 30 day trial. Product info.
It's fast, has a great interface, tons of features, and regularly updated with new features every month or so. It's like using the latest version of Chrome instead of using IE10.
It's not cheap, but if you use your PC for work and enjoy efficient, well thought out software, the unlimited/forever license is comparable to 1.5 months of Adobe Cloud and is easily justifiable. Some of the best money I've ever spend.
It has tabs, blow up thumbnails, custom shortcuts, file folder size (estimated and real time), and the 'double click empty space to go up a folder' feature alone is easily worth $10-15. Quick 'hidden' and 'system' files toggle, favs list, recent list, catalog with colour coding, etc.
Oh, and no ads or data reporting.
Hmm I seriously am thinking about installing Xyplorer or FreeCommander instead of using explorer.. (https://www.xyplorer.com/) (http://freecommander.com/en/summary/)
Haven't got any ads in explorer yet tho.