Anyone who actually THINKS when staring at an Open or Save dialog in Mac OS X is frustrated by its lack of features. Naturally, most people don’t want to be constantly frustrated so we stop thinking about such things. But a better solution is to fix the problem, right?

That’s where Default Folder X comes in. I consider it a necessary tool for design professionals because of how much it improves efficiency by fixing several frustrating navigation weaknesses in Mac OS X’s Open and Save dialog boxes.

It adds many useful new features, such as:

• Instantly rebound to the last item that you selected in a folder
• Instantly access recently-used items
• Select files by typing letters on your keyboard
• Target a Desktop window by either clicking on that window or selecting it from a pop-up menu.
• Copy the name of an existing file into the new file name’s edit box
• Rename and delete files and folders
• “Get Info” on files
• Tell the Finder to open a selected folder on the Desktop
• Assign a default documents folder for any application
• Assign keyboard shortcuts to files and folders
• Quick Look previews of any file that Leopard’s Quick Look can preview for
• Assign a color label to a file

Dan Frakes has a useful overview of Default Folder at the Macworld website, along with a video that shows how it works.

www.macworld.com/article/61405/2007/12/mwvodcast26.html

I use this $35 tool every day and recommend it to any designer who wants to be more productive. And version 4 works happily in Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard.

www.stclairsoft.com/DefaultFolderX/release.html

Jay Nelson

Jay Nelson is the editorial director of PlanetQuark.com, and the editor and publisher of Design Tools Monthly. He’s also the author of the QuarkXPress 8 and QuarkXPress 7 training titles at Lynda.com, as well as the training videos Quark includes in the box with QuarkXPress 7 . In addition, Jay writes regularly for Macworld and Photoshop User magazines and speaks at industry events.