First Thoughts on BC4 Mac

[xgen]

After about 15 mins of use, all I can say is: Thank you! I can stop my search for a good Diff tool on the Mac. The text compare is the best and EZest to use that I have seen.

Feedback on your questions:

• Should files and folders be sorted together alphabetically, like Finder, or sorted with folders on top like BC & Explorer?
  -I vote for folders on top, unless we can have an option in the preferences switching between them.
  
  
• OS X apps generally don't include icons or keyboard shortcuts in their right-click menus, so BC currently doesn't either. Is this an issue for you?
  -Nope Icons are nice, but not required.
  

[ecroutha]

I second xgen... THANK YOU!

I also vote for folders on top. An option would be nice.

Icons are not required IMO.

[Zoë]

Do you two want a fodder sort option because you'd actually use it? Leaving the folders o top like the Windows build is less work for me, so I'm only going to make it sort like Finder if people actually want that. We could have it dependent on where you are, too. The main comparison window could be folders on top for usability's sake, but the browse dialog could show them intermixed, for example.

[svec]

Whatever you choose, the sort/folder order should be the same in ALL parts of BC. Having different sorting order would seem like a bug, and it would be annoying to have to search/scroll in different ways in different parts of the program.

[xgen]

I am personally OK with the folders on top like the windows version has. I discovered last week that Delta Walker has that option, but I have never used it. I put it in the category of, it is minimal effort to add the option, go for it, it will make some people happy. If it is a lot of work, skip it, people will use it and maybe complain. If they do, you can add it in a later version. This is not a critical feature.

[romills]

I agree with Xgen and Ecroutha.. I prefer the folders on top, then files. It would be nice to have an option to change that should you want/need, but I prefer the traditional bf3 and explorer approach. I don't foresee a need for directories interleaved with files, but doesn't mean there isn't one..

[Andrewdotcom]

First Impressions.

Super awesome! Wanted to say this is the most amazing app I have loaded on my mac since perhaps the Adobe suite. And I am very pleased and excited with it so I don't want my input to sound whiny or ungrateful lol because I am very grateful for the awesome super hero devs at Scooter Software. Thank you.

So here it goes:

Contextual highlights are right on.

The Icons "home, session...." Need a more solid button feel to them. Or a separator between them.

New tabs appear above the home icons. Anyway to move them below this? Leaving the home icon row static.

In folder view, the "Copy to Right/Left" should be in some way slightly more noticeable when selections are made. Right now it kinda falls in with the rest.

The rest of it... i'm just amazed at how responsive it is.

[Zoë]

Thanks for the feedback.

What do you mean by contextual highlights?

The look and feel of the toolbars are still a work in progress. The tabs have to stay on top though since the available commands and controls will vary depending on the comparison type.

[ovalsquare]

After about 15 mins of use, all I can say is: Thank you! I can stop my search for a good Diff tool on the Mac. The text compare is the best and EZest to use that I have seen.

Feedback on your questions:

• Should files and folders be sorted together alphabetically, like Finder, or sorted with folders on top like BC & Explorer?
  -I vote for folders on top, unless we can have an option in the preferences switching between them.
  
  
• OS X apps generally don't include icons or keyboard shortcuts in their right-click menus, so BC currently doesn't either. Is this an issue for you?
  -Nope Icons are nice, but not required.
  

Exactly the two items I was going to comment on. Folders on top and I *hate* how Mac OS X does not show the keyboard shortcuts as part of the right-click menus and would love to have them available at least in BC (of course, icons are nice but not required).

[Burnone]

Thanks!

I have missed this application since switching to Mac. The Wine route was such a pain.

I have only used BC4-mac a little while now and my diff workflow is so much better.

[beautdavis]

Opinion questions

Should files and folders be sorted together alphabetically, like Finder, or sorted with folders on top like BC & Explorer?
- Having come from Windows, I'd prefer for folders to be listed on top but making this configurable would be ideal

OS X apps generally don't include icons or keyboard shortcuts in their right-click menus, so BC currently doesn't either. Is this an issue for you?
- Haven't noticed anything missing so I guess not

OS X guidelines say KB/MB file sizes should be in base 10 instead of base 2 (e.g., a kilobyte should be 1000 bytes rather than 1024). Should we do this even though it would be different than the Windows version and could affect things like filters and scripting?
- More of a question than an opinion... does this become and issue if you are comparing folder contents between a Windows network share and an OS X network share?

[Zoë]

More of a question than an opinion... does this become and issue if you are comparing folder contents between a Windows network share and an OS X network share?

No. The actual file sizes are all the same, but it would affect the display if we compress the size because it doesn't fit, and it would affect filtering if you you told it to filter files less than 100KB (as opposed to less than 100,000 bytes).

[tsoslow]

I'd definitely prefer folders sorted above files. Seems like Panic Transmit used to have an option to switch between that and Finder's sort order -- though I can't find it... maybe they removed it.

I really miss the context menu icons. There are so many possible actions and it's easier too look at the icon than the text. Don't think you need keyboard shortcuts.

The display of file size doesn't matter to me as long as its consistent.

[nikolaus]

It may be just me, but I like the intermingled files and folders. If it's extra work, don't worry about it, but it definitely makes an app feel more native.

On the other hand, I'm not a fan of the whole base-10 size thing. As a low-level programmer, I say keep it powers of two!

[ricci]

I feel my life is now complete :-)

Quite seriously though this is great.

I will try and give some useful feed back asap.