An Alternative to the DropPad

I spent the last couple of weeks evaluating EagleFiler and Together for my file management needs. It was clear early on that I preferred EagleFiler’s ways of doing things in all but one respect. Together’s shelf seemed much handier that EF’s drop pad.

Even the Together’s shelf didn’t quite do what I needed, as I couldn’t have multiple libraries on the shelf at one time. EagleFiler’s capture key works for some things, but there are times when I want/need a drag-and-drop option. So I searched the forums and did some experimenting of my own for some alternatives. I’d thought I share my (current) solution.

I gave distinct custom icons to the “To Import” folders of the two EF LIbraries I most often need to drag things to.
I added these folders to Butler’s docklet; if you don’t use Butler, you could add them to your Dock.

Now I can drag a file to my docklet, and drop it into the correct “To Import” folder.

I know that if EF is running (which it is for me most of the time), I can just drag the file to the EF icon, pause to let the Exposé feature turn on, and drop on the right library window, but I find it easier to quickly identify an icon than read the small print on the title bars in Exposé mode.

kabing

Great tip—thanks!

excellent
and how do you create the distinctive icons? that’s a nice touch.

For step-by step directions, see the article titled “Changing the icon of a file or folder” in Finder’s Help. If you go to Finder, click on the Help menu, and type “icons” (without the quotes) in the search box, the article will be one of the options.

Basically you copy an image you want to use, open the Get Info window for the file you want to change, select the icon in the upper left of that window, and paste.

you can get free icons from iconfactory.com, among other places.

If you are going to put the folders on Butler’s Docklet there’s a way to do it through Butler, too.

kabing

thanks–i never even thought of that as a possibility, but it’s very useful to have something besides a generic folder icon.

Speaking of distinctive icons, I changed the EagleFiler icon in the same manner. It opens with the new icon, but after the first “capture” it reverts to the old icon.

This is because EagleFiler changes its Dock icon when capturing and then resets it after the capture is done. If you want to use a custom icon, you would need to replace the EagleFiler.icns file.