RFC Browse Files Pane: Add ‘Show in Fi nder'

PROPOSAL:

   Inside the CTRL Click menu of the Browse Files Pane, add a ”Reveal in 
Finder” command and make that command call the following CLI command:

     open -R “%F”

   “Reveal in Finder” what such commands are typically called in MacOS. 
And, to help users understand how it works, it might also be a good idea 
to use the long version of the command:

     open --reveal “%F”

PROBLEM:

   On the Mac, there is very little integreration between XXE and the 
MacOS Finder (AKA the file browser). For example:

   1. It is not possible to tell the system to open a file in XXE (e.g. 
by double clicking the file in Finder or similar commands).
   2. And, opposite, XXE does not have a way to let the user 
show/select/display a selected or active file in Finder.

   I know no solution to the first problem - from Finder to XXE. But, the 
“open -R” command seems to be a rather simple solution to the second 
problem - displaying a file in the Finder.


SOLUTION:

   The solution is a MacOS solution only. However, it ought to be pretty 
low hanging fruit, as it makes use of the CLI open command (a command 
that we discussed earlier this month):

   In MacOS Terminal.app, if we run

     open --help

   we learn that about the “reveal” option:

       -R, --reveal          Selects in the Finder instead of opening.

   Currently, the 'Default viewer’ command is - by default (sic!) - the 
following command:

     open "%U"

   But if we add the --reveal option, like so:

     open --reveal "%U” /* Or: open --reveal “%F” */

   Then, selecting the Preview commmand (of XXE’s XHTML menu - for 
instance) will display the currently active file in the Finder instead 
of sending the file to the default preview program (for XHTML files, 
typically to the default Web browser).

   The above hack, by way of modifying the command of the Preview menu, 
is already possible. However, to make use of the Preview menu option for 
this, *is* a hack. Also, it requires that one opens the file in XXE, 
before one can run the command. A better solution, would be to add a 
submenu called ‘Reveal in Finder’ to the local CTRL Click menu of the 
'Browse Files Pane'. Then one can display any file in the Finder, 
including files that XXE itself is unable to display.

Leif Halvard Silli

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