Mass Rename Clears Selection

Discussion & Support for xplorer² professional

Moderators: fgagnon, nikos, Site Mods

Post Reply
pj
Gold Member
Gold Member
Posts: 471
Joined: 2006 Jan 26, 14:01
Location: Florida

Mass Rename Clears Selection

Post by pj »

I was performing mass renaming on many files in a very large directory and noticed the renamed files were unselected after being renamed. I needed to cycle through the mass renaming multiple times to get the file set properly named so this became problematic.

I guess I can understand how this might happen if the selection is strictly tied to the filename property.

Is there any way the selection can be maintained after changing only the filename of the directory entry?

-------------------------
PJ in FL
User avatar
nikos
Site Admin
Site Admin
Posts: 15760
Joined: 2002 Feb 07, 15:57
Location: UK
Contact:

Re: Mass Rename Clears Selection

Post by nikos »

when you rename a handful of items then they stay selected, but if you rename too many, then xplorer2 does a generic refresh of the entire folder, so you lose the selection. I would suggest using MARK > SELECTION > STORE menu command but that won't work once items get renamed
pj
Gold Member
Gold Member
Posts: 471
Joined: 2006 Jan 26, 14:01
Location: Florida

Re: Mass Rename Clears Selection

Post by pj »

What's "too many"?

I might be able to limit the number of files being renamed if I knew the range that kept it under the threshold.

Alternately, is there a setting to prevent x2 from performing the refresh until explicitly performed (ctrl-R)?

-------------------------
PJ in FL
User avatar
nikos
Site Admin
Site Admin
Posts: 15760
Joined: 2002 Feb 07, 15:57
Location: UK
Contact:

Re: Mass Rename Clears Selection

Post by nikos »

you could turn off autorefresh from VIEW menu
but i don't understand why you need the selection, does the rename fail?
EMathews3
Bronze Member
Bronze Member
Posts: 87
Joined: 2014 Aug 23, 12:54

Re: Mass Rename Clears Selection

Post by EMathews3 »

This would probably be a multi-stage rename operation, eh?

To get the desired result, more than one pass through the Mass rename wizard is either necessary or easier to deal with conceptually. That's why preserving the selection is useful, even when the selected files have been renamed, including more than once. Selection is usually not based on a filespec/wildcard, so it does not matter that renamed files no longer match a wildcard spec.

I understand Windows has a unique identifier for every file or maybe every directory entry? A GUID-type of pointer. Maybe this part of the filesystem is below Windows' radar, like in the NT kernel. Wondering if that might be useful for persisting a file-selection group across renames, re-sorts and refreshes.
User avatar
nikos
Site Admin
Site Admin
Posts: 15760
Joined: 2002 Feb 07, 15:57
Location: UK
Contact:

Re: Mass Rename Clears Selection

Post by nikos »

that's an interesting idea, I will look into it
User avatar
nikos
Site Admin
Site Admin
Posts: 15760
Joined: 2002 Feb 07, 15:57
Location: UK
Contact:

Re: Mass Rename Clears Selection

Post by nikos »

I've added it for the forthcoming v5.1
Post Reply