Show "size on disk" or file count for folders?

[richardk]

Is there a column that displays "size on disk" for folders? Or second choice, number of files in each folder?

[Kilmatead]

Is there a column that displays "size on disk" for folders? Or second choice, number of files in each folder?

Unless you use an awful lot of Sparse files, it's unlikely you actually want "size on disk", which is different from the standard folder size. If you really do mean "Size on Disk", then no, there's no such column for folders that works the same way as the one intended for sparse-files. (Editorial comment: Needing such a thing would automatically make you, by definition, more interesting than 99% of the humans on the planet. ) If you have no idea what I'm talking about, Nikos wrote a blog...

If you're just talking normal folder sizes then the Size [S] column will show that, as long as you have the "calculate subfolder sizes" option on (I assume you know that, but "for others watching...")

Contents [S] will show the number of items in a folder, which (by default) is the combined count of files and/or folders in that particular folder (it can be modified to count specific filetypes using an advanced option, but that gets a bit "fiddly"). For example it may show "10", but that could mean 5 files + 5 folders, or 10 files or 9 folders and 1 file. It's not great for absolute clarity - for that use <Alt+D> instead.

If you're looking for the Descendant Count (which would be the total number of files contained in a folder + all files in all its subfolders), then no, that's not available in column form - again, use <Alt+D> for that kind of breakdown.

[nikos]

note these features have been improving over the years and won't work as well for your older version 2.5
www.zabkat.com/dinosaur.htm

[richardk]

it's unlikely you actually want "size on disk",

My actual goal is to find any way, whatever it is, whether in X2 or elsewhere, to speed up the copying to external drives of folders that have thousands of very small files and which if I understand correctly contain around 80 to 90% empty space because their Size on Disk is around around five to ten times larger than their Size. So I'm open to any suggestions - doesn't have to involve X2.

I found by trial and error if that you zip them the size is reduced maybe 80 or 90% and copying goes that much faster. Also apart from backing up I might zip some folders I rarely use so they don't slow down file managers etc. A typical example is folders containing backups of fonts. I would say there's 20 or 30 folders in all. So I was thinking if there was a column for Size on Disk and total number of files in all child folders I could quickly see which ones have (1) large size discrepancy, (2) large number of files, (3) large absolute Size on Disk. Or even just with Size on Disk and not file counts I'd know which ones are likely to have very high file numbers.

This could also prevent some of those many, many, *many* train wrecks where you go to a folder and x2 suddenly decides to show thumbnails and therefore freezes as it always does when confronted with more than maybe 40 of them, even though you've never once used thumbnails in that folder and would never want to, nor for that matter have you used them at all for the past few days. An ongoing problem for 15+ years through seven or eight brand-new computers across XP, 7 and 8.1. I believe the official diagnosis was "something in your computer's causing it".

[richardk]

note these features have been improving over the years and won't work as well for your older version 2.5
www.zabkat.com/dinosaur.htm

Yes, I didn't know about Contents until now and so far it's underreporting a lot.