i3 FAQ - Individual question feed

x file manager with nice keyboard shortcuts

Thu, 09 Oct 2014 01:25:03 +0000

The thing that nowadays drives me most often to pick up the mouse is when browsing for files, in an open or save dialog. I have been using Dolphin, and I am lacking a shortcut to move to focus to the files pane. Tabbing while paying extra attention to check when it becomes selected is inefficient. In any case, what I'd really like is a file manager with nice shortcuts that somehow gets used by all (most) x applications in their "open" or "save" dialogs, that has some shortcut for that. I don't really know how that works, but I doubt a terminal file manager like "ranger" would do for that. Do you have any suggestions?

Answer by Michael Rose for
The thing that nowadays drives me most often to pick up the mouse is when browsing for files, in an open or save dialog. I have been using Dolphin, and I am lacking a shortcut to move to focus to the files pane. Tabbing while paying extra attention to check when it becomes selected is inefficient. In any case, what I'd really like is a file manager with nice shortcuts that somehow gets used by all (most) x applications in their "open" or "save" dialogs, that has some shortcut for that. I don't really know how that works, but I doubt a terminal file manager like "ranger" would do for that. Do you have any suggestions?

Thu, 09 Oct 2014 01:49:03 +0000

Check out spacefm. Its entirely possible to bind not only normal actions to keys but custom scripts to be run on the targeted file. Pretty neat. Incidentally in dolphin I have bound : to toggle the terminal below the file manager window (note terminal NOT open terminal here) and use autojump in the terminal portion to jump around efficiently. Wherever you jump to in the terminal the GUI will follow. Additionally instead of using split view which lacks a binding to switch between sides I simply open 2 file managers which means I can use the regular navigation hotkeys. As a result I can use dolphin without hardly touching the mouse.

Comment by Rojo for
Check out spacefm. Its entirely possible to bind not only normal actions to keys but custom scripts to be run on the targeted file. Pretty neat.

Incidentally in dolphin I have bound : to toggle the terminal below the file manager window (note terminal NOT open terminal here) and use autojump in the terminal portion to jump around efficiently. Wherever you jump to in the terminal the GUI will follow.

Additionally instead of using split view which lacks a binding to switch between sides I simply open 2 file managers which means I can use the regular navigation hotkeys.

As a result I can use dolphin without hardly touching the mouse.

Thu, 09 Oct 2014 03:13:15 +0000

Thanks, I am checking it out. Do you know how to make some file manager become the standard for the "open" or "save" dialogs of applications (if that is possible)?

Answer by cee for
The thing that nowadays drives me most often to pick up the mouse is when browsing for files, in an open or save dialog. I have been using Dolphin, and I am lacking a shortcut to move to focus to the files pane. Tabbing while paying extra attention to check when it becomes selected is inefficient. In any case, what I'd really like is a file manager with nice shortcuts that somehow gets used by all (most) x applications in their "open" or "save" dialogs, that has some shortcut for that. I don't really know how that works, but I doubt a terminal file manager like "ranger" would do for that. Do you have any suggestions?

Fri, 10 Oct 2014 08:25:00 +0000

pcmanfm 1.2.2 works pretty well for me. It has some hard coded keyboard shortcuts to switch between Toolbar, Folder View and Side Pane. F6: change focus Side pane <-> Folder view Ctrl+L or Alt+D: jump focus to Path Bar See Help > Keyboard Navigation for the rest of available shortcuts.