Comments

• 

  Dsuni Ubachev

  Apr 3, 2007 at 10:43 am

  I want any directory that I open in vista to show the same simple columns in details mode:
  Size, date modified, type in that order.

  Also every folder that I open I want it to open in details mode by default. And by default I want these three simple columns. How do I get vista to do that.

  And when I say every folder, I mean every folder: My Documents, My Pictures, My videos, a USB drive that I connect, I mean every folder by default.

  Can you tell me how to do this?

• 

  Dsuni Ubachev

  Apr 3, 2007 at 10:47 am

  Another question, I would like Vista to show me the size of folders while in Details mode.

  In windows XP I had to buy a program called Treesize in order to get the OS to show me folder sizes in Explorer, I hope Vista built this feature into the OS.

• 

  Joe

  Apr 3, 2007 at 2:33 pm

  It appears you can show all folders in detail view on a secondary partition or disk, but not on the system disk (lame, I know). To do this, right click on the ‘disk’ in the computer window, and choose properties. Click on the customize tab and make sure ‘all items’, and check the ’subdirectories’ box. Click ‘OK’ and all folders on that disk should be in detail view.

• 

  Joe

  Apr 3, 2007 at 2:34 pm

  Their isn’t a built in feature to show folder sizes in the detail view, you’re stuck hovering over each folder and waiting for the tooltip. From a quick look around the internet, none of the tools that did this in XP are yet Vista compatible, and you’re not the only one that wishes this feature was built into Vista…

• 

  Jon

  May 24, 2007 at 7:32 pm

  Is there a way to get the “Customize” button for the properties of the root of c: ? My system has chosen the pictures and videos template for this, and all new folders. I can change the other folders, but not the root of c: (or the program files folder).

• 

  Chris

  Jun 3, 2007 at 4:43 pm

  Are any updates available that enable Vista to display M4A file metadata within music directories? I’ve had no luck in finding anything, although my MP3 files display just fine.

  Thanks,
  Chris

• 

  HackMan

  Jul 11, 2007 at 12:11 am

  Hi, I wondered how to add own columns to the list.
  In special i miss the cdolumns from tortoise SVN which i had under XP.

• 

  Don

  Jul 13, 2007 at 12:50 am

  Like Dsuni, and probably lot’s of people, all I want to see is name, size, date, and type.
  Is there a special design team at Redmond who find ways of making Vista difficult to use or does it just happen naturally?

• 

  Tom

  Aug 12, 2007 at 5:36 pm

  I’m in the same boat as Don and Dsuni. I really hope they do something to change this behavior. If I view a folder with a single picture in it, all files are displayed with columns that are inappropriate for the file type.

  It would maybe be nice if Vista was smart enough to choose columns that actually have information to show. These media columns only apply to like 3 or 4 directories on my whole system, yet Vista chooses this view for most of my directories in detail view.

• 

  Sam

  Aug 19, 2007 at 6:06 am

  I want all my music folders to show exactly the same columns that I chose in Detail view . I don’t want to customize the columns I see in Detail view for each music folder separately. Is there a way to do this?

• 

  Chris

  Aug 19, 2007 at 4:47 pm

  Don’t forget that Vista still sometimes forgets the templates you choose for folders and the window size (at least in my experience). And for some reason, I haven’t been able to change the template for multiple folders at once (even though there’s the option to, and I’m sure I was able to do so before; hmm . . .).

• 

  Joe

  Sep 14, 2007 at 12:07 am

  Oh Yay…
  I am really glad that I’m not the only one here. I spent some time with microsoft via email on this topic (xp) and couldn’t even get them to understand what I was talking about. Maybe they don’t use their OS? For anything practical, anyway…like listening to mp3’s? I have 2,619 folders in “my music” and would like to see the Artist level in icon style and the Album level in detail style WITH my chosen set of detail fields. Anyone smart has a solution for this, help a brother out!

• 

  Joe

  Sep 14, 2007 at 12:10 am

  Maybe a registry hack? .. anyone?

• 

  Joe

  Sep 14, 2007 at 12:12 am

  Oh…except, at least in xp, windows managed this by a “cookie” of sorts in each folder…either the desktop.ini file or the thumbs.db file. I forget which.

• 

  Joe

  Sep 14, 2007 at 12:12 am

  btw…different joe than the one in previous posts.

• 

  Daniel P

  Nov 30, 2007 at 8:19 am

  I’m still waiting for the same answer, Ive been having to manually change permissions for each folder, very annoying…. any fix would be greatly appreciated, and bring more traffic back to this site

• 

  Tom

  Nov 30, 2007 at 10:23 am

  Well, I’m not sure if I’m just blind or dumb or both, but I figured out how to manage my folder views and it appears to have always been there:P

  My problem may not have been the same as everyone elses, but basically I was frustrated by the way “detail” views of folders would often be formatted for media just because the folder contained a single media file. I definately prefer the standard “detail” formatting from previous windows versions.

  Anyway, every folder has a “Customize” tab under the “Properties” window. Selecting “All Items” under “What kind of folder do you want?” provides the typical detail formatting. There is also a checkbox for applying the option to all subfolders, so you can manage entire folder trees all at once.

  Hope this helps someone. Its taken me some getting used to how features have been organized in Vista.

• 

  Daniel P

  Nov 30, 2007 at 11:16 am

  Thanks for the post Tom, what we are looking for is how to apply those customized property settings as a default for all windows folders, so you dont have to manually change each one.

• 

  johan

  Dec 13, 2007 at 5:54 pm

  I agree coplete with Daniel P;
  I am waiting for a solution for this very annoying problem of Vista too !!

• 

  Christopher J.

  Jan 2, 2008 at 11:32 pm

  What ever happened to the concept of “user-friendly” apps and operating systems. Keep it simple, stupid! (And when I say “stupid”, I’m talking to Microsoft.)

  A number of studies have found that *more* options often make people more frustrated and less happy than they would be with *less* options.

  After years of tinkering with my Windows systems, I kind of know my way around things. But for the common Joe who just buys a computer to stay with the times, they’re more likely to be totally confused when things don’t work the way they intuitively think they should.

  Any product that makes a user feel like an idiot is actually a broken product, not suitable for retail.

  3… 2… 1… Rant over…

  Anyhoo…

• 

  nylon

  Jan 22, 2008 at 8:16 am

  MS adds 200 file details columns and TAKES AWAY the one I always used : the file extension! Grrr.
  And “File Type” is not a suitable alternative because (for example) it groups mp3, wav, m4a etc as the same “type”.
  Dumb move, Microsoft!

• 

  Joe

  Jan 22, 2008 at 11:20 am

  @Nylon: Wow, that does suck. Why remove one that already existed? Doesn’t make sense…

• 

  Daniel Patterson

  Jan 22, 2008 at 9:38 pm

  I’m gonna keep my eye on this forum until someone finds a solution, I’m sure someone will make a windows patch for this as its such an extention option for quickly sorting and browsing files. Microsoft leaving this out shows how far behind they are from AXXXple as much as I am a die hard PC ninja.

• 

  Joe M

  Jan 22, 2008 at 11:22 pm

  Don’t hold your breath, Daniel. I originally posted here Sept, 2007. There are no answers. Bill (Gates) even messed things up more with Vista. I don’t think things will get better. Anyone know of a folder sorting application that works. Speaking of Apple…

• 

  Michael

  Feb 15, 2008 at 12:43 pm

  This multi-step process worked for me. You will get most of the folders that you work with if you do this to the C:\Users directory but you can do it to others also:

  1. Open Computer and click on your OS drive (usually C:).

  2. Right click on each major directory (one at a time) that you care about folder views, such as ‘Users’, and select “Properties” and then click the “Customize” tab. You can’t do this on your root or OS drive nor on some directories, like Programs and Windows but you can do it in their subdirectories.

  3. For each folder it will ask – What kind of folder do you want? Select “All items”. Check “Also apply this template to all subfolders”. Click OK.

  4. Open Explorer or Documents or anything that gives you a folder view and select a random folder. Set up the columns however you want – I like to show details with name, size, type, date modified, date created, and path – you can pick whatever you want – set it for details, icons, whatever.

  5. Now, from the menu bar, click on Tools, Folder Options, View.

  6. In the “Advanced Settingsâ€? scroll box, check Remember each folder’s view settings.

  NOTE: If unchecked, Vista will ignore custom view settings for every folder and have every folder open using default settings instead. Only uncheck this setting to force all folders to stop using display settings you have specified.

  7. Click Apply.

  8. Click “Apply to Folders” button in the “Folder Viewsâ€? box at top of window.

  9. Reboot your computer and see how that works for you.

  It may not get every folder that you have set up now but it should get most of them and will definitely cover any new folders.

• 

  Jim Bailey

  Aug 29, 2008 at 10:41 am

  In XP, you could edit some of those details by right clicking the icon, selecting properties, and entering the information under the Summary Tab. In Vista, you can sometimes do this on the details tab, but not for all file types.

  Is there a file editor that one can use to edit these details?
  If a general editor is not available, can it be done for PDF files?

• 

  Martin Griffin

  Sep 24, 2008 at 9:10 am

  I worked out how to customise the root of C: (Vista had changed it to media layout)

  Right click on the bar that contains the column headings and select More… and bingo!

  B-)

• 

  Opsman000

  Oct 5, 2008 at 3:08 am

  Vista allows you to choose folder formats (templates) and to add whatever of the 267 detail options you want which display properly; however, it doesn’t allow you to edit these detail fields in the Properties Box. So I’m miffed as to what the purpose is to allow the choice of folder templates and the choice of detail options. Anyone have a clue?

• 

  JP

  Oct 30, 2008 at 1:35 pm

  I have chosen what type of details I want for my folders, but I can’t write information for those columns. I have come to the conclusion that it might be due to my folders being read- only folders. Is this true or am I am I doing something wrong? If so, how can I change this?
  HELP!

• 

  Opsman000

  Nov 4, 2008 at 2:49 am

  JP, You aren’t doing anything wrong. If you can’t edit the detail field in the Properties Box then it can’t be edited. At this time the main function of being able to choose detail fields is to delete the ones you don’t want to see in the file/folder template.

• 

  JP

  Nov 5, 2008 at 4:01 pm

  Opsman000, thank you so much! But now I do have a stupid question…how do I get to the original File/folder template?
  I appreciate your time:())….JP, thanks

• 

  Opsman000

  Nov 6, 2008 at 7:32 pm

  Hey JP, no problem Just a couple clicks to change template. Click on Folder, right click, click Properties, click Customize, choose folder type from drop down window, click Apply. That’s it.

• 

  Leo

  Feb 26, 2009 at 8:12 am

  In reading these comments, I noticed that Dsuni Ubachev asked a question almost two years ago and hasn’t received a full answer yet. I would like to suggest an answer that I think will work, but I can’t be sure because I’m a little afraid to try it myself.

  Open My Computer (or just Computer). Put the view in list mode. Click on one of the drive names. Press Control-A. This will highlight all the drives. Unselect any drives whose view you don’t want to change (especially your CD/DVD drive and Bluetooth Information Exchanger, if you have it). The remaining drives will be highlighted. Without losing that highlighting, right-click on any one of the highlighted drives (except the C drive) and choose properties.

  A dialog box will come up with a tab for each of the drives, but there will be an extra tab that says “Customize”. In that tab you can set your folder type to “All Items” and check the box beside “Also apply this template to all subfolders”.

  When you click OK, that will probably change the view for all of your subfolders on all of those drives at once. You might want to do this while logged in as Administrator so you won’t have permission problems with some folders.

  Before you do this, read steps 5 to 9 of Michael’s comment on Feb 15, 2008 at 12:43 pm.

  Hope this works. As I said, I haven’t tried it myself.

• 

  D'suni Ubachev

  Mar 19, 2009 at 9:40 am

  Thanks for following up. I appreciate your dedication on a post almost 2 years old. I’m also a little afraid to try it, if i get up the nerve, I’ll try it and let you know. Thanks again.

• 

  mike

  Jun 4, 2009 at 11:25 pm

  here’s the info you are looking for…
  http://www.vistax64.com/tutorials/77444-windows-explorer-folder-type-templates.html

• 

  PLANETCOP

  Sep 26, 2009 at 11:23 am

  Hi:Uslam Peace Shalom:
  When u have the columns and then just require only 4 to items, like size, type and date…how do we default this. because once we have the threeor four and then restart even the computer along the top all the column names show up again! frusssstttrrrraaaaaattttttinnnng!

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