Explorer++ 1.4.0 beta

New features

• The bookmarks system has been rewritten. The updated system has the following changes from the previous system:
  • Bookmarks are now managed in a very similar way to how they're managed in web browsers such as Chrome and Firefox. Bookmarks can be added to one of three top-level folders:
    • Bookmarks toolbar
    • Bookmarks menu
    • Other bookmarks
  • The add bookmark and manage bookmark dialogs are more functional than their equivalents in the previous version.
    For example, the manage bookmarks dialog allows items to be renamed directly (rather than by opening the edit bookmark dialog) and shows an appropriate context menu for bookmark folders in the treeview.
  • Bookmarks can now be copied/pasted.
  • When a bookmark is copied, the location of the bookmark is also copied as plain text. This makes it possible to paste the location into other applications.
  • Bookmarks can now be dragged and dropped between the bookmark windows.
  • Bookmarks on the bookmarks toolbar can now be arranged via drag and drop.
  • Right-clicking an item in the dropdown shown when clicking a folder on the bookmarks toolbar now shows the appropriate context menu.
  • In addition to being able to bookmark the current tab, it's also possible to bookmark all open tabs.
  • When a bookmark is displayed, the icon for the associated folder will be used (rather than a generic icon).
  • When right-clicking a bookmark folder, it's possible to open all child bookmarks in new tabs.
  • A number of issues present in the previous system are no longer relevant. For example:
    • The bookmark menu wasn't being built correctly (folders could be shown with the wrong name).
    • Selecting "Bookmark This Tab..." from the dropdown shown when clicking a folder on the bookmarks toolbar had no effect.
    • "Open" and "Open in New Tab" items would be shown when right-clicking a folder on the bookmarks toolbar, but selecting them would have no effect.
    • Neither the bookmarks toolbar nor the bookmarks menu would update when a bookmark was moved up/down.
    • The bookmarks menu wasn't updated when a bookmark was updated.
  • The bookmark description field has been removed.
• Settings are now automatically saved every 30 seconds. This helps to prevent recent tabs or other settings from being lost if the application crashes.
• The default icons used by the application have been updated. Additionally, a second set of Windows 10 style icons have been added. It's possible to switch between the two icon sets via Tools > Options > General > Icon theme.
• Added partial support for high DPI displays.
• It's now possible to reopen a recently closed tab using File > Reopen Recent Tab. The most recently closed tab can be reopened using Ctrl+Shift+T.
• The display window can now be displayed on the right. Previously, it was always displayed at the bottom.
• Support for the "Date Deleted" and "Original Location" recycle bin columns has been implemented.
• A context menu is now shown when right-clicking the empty space in the tab bar.
• When renaming a file, it's possible to move to the next item by pressing tab. Shift+tab can now be used to move to the previous item.
• Toolbar buttons are now available for the following actions:
  • Split file
  • Merge files
  • Close tab

Bug fixes

• The way in which column results and file icons/thumbnails are retrieved has been updated. This update brings a number of advantages:
  • Because of the way in which column result/icons/thumbnails were retrieved previously, it was possible for the application to crash if a navigation occurred while one of these items was being retrieved. Navigating to a different directory or closing a tab while results are being retrieved should now have no negative effects.
  • Column details are only retrieved for items that are visible (rather than all items).
  • Previously, it was possible for a user interface update to be done after a navigation had occurred. That is, column data for an item in a previous folder would be inserted into the listview for the current folder. This is no longer possible.
  • Previously, if an item was moved (within the listview) or deleted, it was possible for the wrong item to be updated once a column result/icon/thumbnail had been retrieved. This is no longer possible.
• When right-clicking on the listview background in Windows 10, Explorer++ would crash. To resolve this, the OneDrive shell extension is now ignored when showing the menu. See #35.
• Items in virtual folders (e.g. library folders) can now be renamed and deleted.
• Items can now be copied to/moved to virtual folders (using the "Copy To Folder"/"Move To Folder" functionality).
• New folders can now be created in virtual folders.
• Fixed issue with date conversion. Previously, dates would be converted in the current time zone, rather than the time zone in effect at the time being converted.
• Fixed an issue that caused taskbar thumbnails (shown on Windows 7 and above) to not always be displayed correctly. See #55.
• When renaming a file, it's possible to press tab to put the next file into edit mode. On Windows 10, pressing tab would select the next file, but it would not go into edit mode. Fixed. See #50.
• Previously, when creating a file via the new menu in Windows 10, the file would not be put into edit mode. Fixed. See #48.
• The Explorer++ icon shown in the volume mixer was larger than it should have been. Fixed. See #24.
• Under certain conditions, switching to a tab using the taskbar thumbnails would result in the wrong tab being selected. Fixed.
• Under certain conditions, refreshing a tab via the tab right-click menu would result in the wrong tab being refreshed. Fixed.
• Fixed a crash that could occur when switching directories.
• When grouping items by date created/modified/accessed, the items weren't being properly sorted into their groups (as month/year boundaries weren't being handled). Fixed.
• Previously, when a date was formatted as a friendly date, year/month boundaries weren't being taken into account. This meant that a date would only be shown as "Yesterday" if it was in the same month/year as the current date. Fixed.
• When adding or removing a column via the listview header context menu, the sort by/group by menus wouldn't be updated. Fixed.
• When opening the set file attributes dialog, the creation date shown was incorrect. Fixed.
• The set file attributes dialog wasn't correctly handling the case where an attribute checkbox was indeterminate. Fixed.
• There was an issue that meant that the group sorting direction in one tab could affect the group sorting order in other tabs. Fixed.
• When adding the folders button to the main toolbar (either by resetting the toolbar or by adding that individual button), the state of the button wouldn't be set correctly. Even if the folders pane was shown, the button wouldn't be checked. Fixed.
• When using the "list" view mode, right-clicking the empty space in a row would inconsistently result in the item being selected. Now, an item is only selected if you right-click its filename label.
• When loading from the XML config file, the initial color in the color rule dialog wasn't been loaded correctly. Fixed.
• There was an issue that prevented labels in the treeview from being unfolded. Now, if you move the mouse over a treeview label that's only partially visible, the rest of the label will be shown in a tooltip.
• Fixed a number of memory leaks.

Misc

• Windows XP and Vista are no longer supported. Windows 7 is now the minimum supported version.
• All menus are now drawn in the standard system style, rather than a custom style.
• More detailed help information is now available when starting Explorer++ from the command line with the --help flag. Each of the available options is listed and briefly described. The names of some of the options have also been updated.
• Starting a command prompt via the file menu opens a command prompt in the current directory. Starting an admin command prompt now does the same thing (rather than opening in the default directory).
• The format used to display dates has been updated. Previously, the date and time were separated by a comma. Now, they're separated by a space.
• Dates are now displayed without seconds.
• Infotips for files/folders are now retrieved on a background thread. This stops the application from hanging when retrieving the infotip for a large folder.
• Listview icons are now cached. This helps to avoid the flickering that can occur when refreshing a directory or going back/forward (the apparent flickering occurs as the default file/folder icons are replaced with the actual file/folder icons).
• The way in which the document summary fields (e.g. title, subject) are retrieved has been updated. This means that the fields should now be displayed for more file types (e.g. Word documents).
• When selecting a file path with spaces in the application toolbar button dialog, the path is now quoted (which is necessary for paths with spaces).
• The columns in the select columns dialog are now sorted by name, with the current set of columns appearing at the top of the list.
• When grouping by file extension, the application would attempt to retrieve the extension for both files and folders. Now, the extension will only be retrieved for files. Folders will be grouped together in a "Folder" group.
• The order in which view modes are cycled (when clicking the "Views" button on the toolbar or scrolling the mouse wheel while holding ctrl) has been reversed to match the order used in Windows Explorer.
• A third-party credits dialog has been added, which can be opened via the about dialog.