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Briefly: Snow Leopard Finder icons support QuickLook

appleinsider.com — Apple's upcoming Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard operating system will reportedly see support for the company's QuickLook technology extended from specialized preview windows to Finder icons themselves.

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  • Erred, on 07/21/2008, -15/+2Would it be any much use if I could play a video... within an icon? I don't think so. XD
    • mediaphile, on 07/22/2008, -1/+10a) you could just want to check that it's the video you're looking for
      2) you might just want the audio of a video to play. with normal quicklook, the file stops playing as soon as you switch applications, this mode allows background playback.
  • MarianaPeyton, on 07/21/2008, -4/+43This is really great for downloading an MP3 file and pressing play. Sometimes I think of what could get better on OS X (except bugs and file system) but Apple seems to find a way to innovate in a way that no one has done before.
    • Protoss, on 07/22/2008, -8/+11This feature is actually available in the latest GNOME, so Apple didn't think of it all by themselves.
      • prammy, on 07/22/2008, -3/+3Actually its been in Gnome for a while. The preview play for audio files came out during the Gnome 1.x days when Nautilus was an Eazel product.
      • newbill123, on 07/22/2008, -2/+2As I recall, it was also in that old BeOS preview from the mid nineties and people were saying then that it wasn't "original". I guess the good thing is that it isn't patent protected due to prior art.
      • iumentum, on 07/22/2008, -2/+2Really? How do you do it in gnome? I can't seem to play mp3 files or watch video without opening them in some kind of player.
        Or maybe you are just talking about nautilus' limited support for making thumbnails as an icon of some types of files?
      • linusl, on 07/22/2008, -1/+1iumentum: I knew for a while that this feature existed in nautilus but couldn't figure out how to use it, I discovered how it works by accident. When I hover the icon for a soundfile in nautilus a smaller icon appears in the corner of the icon. If I keep my mouse still the sound starts to play within a second or so. As soon as I move the mouse away from the icon, the playback stops. I use ubuntu.
      • iumentum, on 07/22/2008, -1/+1linusl~
        Yep, sure thing, that works. I never knew about that. I stand corrected there. Gladly so.
      • prammy, on 07/23/2008, -0/+1In the initial releases of nautilus (for gnome 1.x) , if you had the sidebar enabled, you could 'preview' the sound files by clicking the play button in the sidebar.

        It was taken out in Gnome 2.0. For the past few releases Gnome would allow you to preview a sound file by hovering over it.
    • arjung, on 07/22/2008, -0/+2but i like to hit space and see all of the meta-data on the mp3 to make sure it's what i wanted. i hope they keep the old behavior (space for a popup player) and the new one (mouse click for a icon-player). even better would be if both support this "playing when Finder is in the background" behavior.
    • schneb, on 07/22/2008, -0/+2Comment Dugg for one paragraph of truth. Could not disagree with anything you said. Is the OS perfect? Far from it. Innovative? Indeed. QuickLook the best thing since sliced bread? Absolutely.
  • sruffelman, on 07/21/2008, -15/+9This seems like it would be useful for previewing music but almost useless for video. When you use 32x32 icons, a movie will be too small to actually preview.
    • jasmus, on 07/22/2008, -0/+7Icons can be up to 128x128. not ideal for video, but it is only meant as a preview.
      • dagamer34, on 07/22/2008, -0/+2Icons can be up to 512x512 in Leopard. Get with the times man!
      • jasmus, on 07/22/2008, -0/+2I think the 512x512 icons are only if you're using coverflow.
      • SpacePirate, on 07/22/2008, -0/+3Both correct. The .icns file is up to 512x512, but the icons in the finder only go up to 128.
    • DeFex, on 07/22/2008, -6/+1But think how cool it will look, and how it might make some people buy a faster mac!
    • newbill123, on 07/22/2008, -0/+3It will be nostalgic for users of Quicktime before version 4. Didn't people refer to them as moving postage stamps? Someone should find an old CD of Quicktime movies back from System 7.1 days. Move the 100's of postage stamps over to OS X and have a ball.
    • marcushe, on 07/22/2008, -0/+1Well, I think the point of the icon video is strictly for recognizing the video if you didn't know what it was.
  • SquareEnix, on 07/21/2008, -13/+8unless the icon is 256 x 256, i see no point for it with video.
    • zakatov, on 07/22/2008, -0/+14That's why you can always press space bar and have it play in a dedicated quicklook window
      • newbill123, on 07/22/2008, -1/+3While Quicklook is pretty handy to make a quick, full screen slideshow of a bunch of porn or a large multimedia file (using a standard codec), I kind of wish Apple would have the spacebar open the get info window when only a single file is selected.

        Get Info has those big Preview icons and if you want to see other information (file size or spotlight keywords) it'd be more useful than just the single purpose QuickLook preview windows in Leopard now.
  • ElBeh, on 07/21/2008, -22/+4Sounds bloaty.
    • mediaphile, on 07/22/2008, -1/+6I'm sure it's using mostly the same coreaudio/corevideo/coreimage code as quicklook, i.e., no bloat.
  • DirtPile, on 07/22/2008, -20/+2Bloatity bloat bloat bloat.
  • teh_spazz, on 07/22/2008, -21/+4Interesting, all the negative comments here are getting dugg down.

    I'll reiterate, bloaty.
    • ChefEspeff, on 07/22/2008, -0/+11It's not because they're negative it's because they're pointless. If someone wants to write up a technical reason why this is going to be bloaty people might digg it up. This is just like when people say "cool article". You're gonna get dugg down, not necessarily for your opinion but because you don't present it in an interesting way or with any facts to support it.
    • wellyuk, on 07/22/2008, -0/+6I'll reiterate - dugg down.
    • jasmus, on 07/22/2008, -0/+7because they all lack evidence. A feature of an OS that's not out yet is being called bloaty without any good resoning as to how they came to the conclusion. You're suprise the trolls are getting dugg down? I would be dugg down just as much if i just posted "awesome".
    • sittered, on 07/22/2008, -0/+1It's most likely not bloated at all, since this new button probably just accesses the same QuickLook feature that's been there since Leopard was released.
  • 5wallace, on 07/22/2008, -17/+12Don't get me wrong, I love just about everything Apple, but this got to the front page, really?
    • reformation, on 07/22/2008, -0/+4Too late, I 'got you wrong'.

    • ilgaz, on 07/22/2008, -3/+1anything not related to iPhone is welcome.
  • bbqsalad, on 07/22/2008, -13/+4Hey look over there! its a crab bloat!
  • transform100, on 07/22/2008, -1/+8that's pretty freaking cool!
  • Groovel76, on 07/22/2008, -11/+4Ubuntu has this feature already(along with other linux flavors I'm sure), for audio files at least. I turn it off. It's annoying to have music start playing everytime your cursor slides over an icon. It really sucks if you're not paying attention and stop your cursor over an really loud song and forgot you have your speakers turned up a bit.

    Not that Apple gives a damn but I say bag the idea.
    • zzz@tkz, on 07/22/2008, -0/+17Hence the play button, and not autoplay.

  • alpha88, on 07/22/2008, -1/+3Nice, I didn't see a reason to upgrade before, but I have enough similar files that this will be handy.
  • stinkypyper, on 07/22/2008, -8/+2This is gonna be one slow ass preview generation, but ya, apples rock.
  • Raian, on 07/22/2008, -6/+2I can't wait for this release if only for one reason... increased hard drive space. Hurry up Apple with your non-feature driven upgrade.
  • knodi, on 07/22/2008, -10/+2Finder is so weak. ***** improve it already.
    • newbill123, on 07/22/2008, -3/+2I love the Mac and have used the Finder since System 6.0.4, but knodi's comment is pretty accurate. The Finder / ResEdit / NeXT File Manager hybrid never was as elegant as the pre-OS X versions.

      While this icon feature is a good idea in any file finding and launching user interface, I expected instead that Apple would use the Snow Leopard release to finally transition to a Cocoa or Core based Finder rather than just grafting more features onto the non-evolving Carbon version. The Finder is one app that I think would have use for 64 bit clean development.
    • TastyLamp, on 07/22/2008, -0/+1What's wrong with it? Aside from no cut command.
      • newbill123, on 07/22/2008, -0/+1What's could be improved with the Finder technically?
        * It's built on a Carbon base. And Carbon, we're told (this year) won't be making the transition to 64-bit clean API's.
        * It gets "special treatment" from Apple with hooks deep into the OS. Unlike other "default apps" like Quicktime Player or Preview, the Finder isn't replaceable as the default with any other file finding & launching app. It has hooks into being the app that controls the desktop even though this valuable function could be opened to other apps (monitoring a security camera, showing a stock ticker, etc). If the Finder itself is offering special services, move them to the system libraries. If it's just using hidden system libraries then those services should be opened up to developers. Apple works best when it's kept honest by eating the same dog food it gives to developers to use.
        * Performance can still be an issue. While some of users' complaints about the beach ball of death are due to system resource starvation, the Finder seems like a prime candidate for the Snow Leopard features like OpenCL and Grand Central.

        While the user-interface problems aren't universal (I've never missed the cut command you desire, for example), here are three big user interface issues for me.
        * It's too easy to accidentally make your temporary changes to a window the defaults for every new Finder window.
        * It offers enough advanced options to confuse users (e.g. file permissions) but not enough to be truly friendly and useful to an advanced user (e.g. view .hidden files).
        * It's very modal. Want to hide the status bar? It's a constantly grayed out menu option unless you happen to have also hidden the toolbar. Want to use the command key shortcut to sort your list view by size? Control-Cmd-4 works in icon view, but not in others like column or list view. It seems like the glued together work of 4 or 5 different teams rather than one team with a guided by one set of goals and ideas.
  • thetanman, on 07/22/2008, -0/+18I noticed I could play an .mp3 file within Gmail for the first time the other day, too. Whenever I browse files on my PC now I feel like I've stepped back 10 years or something. The new Finder is the main reason I use Leopard now.
    • geoken, on 07/22/2008, -6/+2Install Linux on your PC. It already previews mp3's (hover your mouse over an mp3 and it will start playing after a second) and most other filetypes (pics [obviously], pdf's, svg's, eps, video, etc, etc) in the icon.
      • Konstantino, on 07/22/2008, -0/+3I know Linux distros are great and all, but you guys are getting worse than the Apple fanboys. This is a Mac topic, don't go off it. You also failed to mention which distro of Linux.
      • pyrates, on 07/22/2008, -0/+1I would guess it is ubuntu. Course it never showed up for me, so how did you do it?
      • geoken, on 07/22/2008, -1/+1Every distro with an up to date version of Gnome can do this. You may have to check in your system options in case it's disabled by default. You may also have to tell Nautilus to generate previews for files above a certain size (some distro's may set it low by default because generating previews uses cpu cycles, especially videos and large pdf's/svg's)

        Also, the guy specifically mentioned the inability to do this on his PC so I replied letting him know he can do that with Linux. It's not like I left a comment in the main thread saying "Linux rulez, it can already do this". I was merely replying to someone who specifically commented on the inability to do this on a PC.

        If you want to call someone a fanboy, why don't you look at the guy saying he feels like his going back 10 years when he uses his PC rather than me who did nothing more than correct him?
  • newbill123, on 07/22/2008, -0/+4One other point mentioned in the article was not about icons but about needing to enter the password twice when using the Installer app (rather than using a drag and drop install like most apps do).

    The double password entry required for using the installer. They're obviously giving the installer more power to analyze the file system or more net access and hence need more security to protect data even before anything is actually installed. That justifies moving the password to the start of the process, but why enter it a second time? Lengthy installs? Possibility of someone walking away from the machine? Couldn't they do the same timed base install like for sudo in the terminal?
    • thetanman, on 07/22/2008, -0/+4sudo make me a sandwhich.
    • zeeky, on 07/22/2008, -2/+2This is more retarded than my iPhone asking me if Maps can use my location. Of course you can install it, it's my own computer. Of course you can use my location, that's your job stupid maps program! Of all the things they could copy from vista why do they have to go with constant useless popups?
      • Angostura, on 07/22/2008, -1/+1"Of course you can install it, it's my own computer."

        Thank you. Stealth virus installed.

        "Of course you can use my location, that's your job stupid maps program! "

        Thank You, rogue application now transmitting your exact location and history of movements.

        ---------
        Yes, you're right. Best not to think or worry too much about such things. Just let software writers get on using your machine without you intervening.
      • willynilly, on 07/22/2008, -1/+1Entering your password once, twice, or a dozen times doesn't prevent any of the above, you noob.
      • horsepie, on 07/22/2008, -0/+0If an app needs your password before installing it can't secret install crap in the background without you knowing (refer to IE ActiveX around 2003). Sure some idiots will enter their password anyway, but the people who know better will be able to click deny.
    • willynilly, on 07/22/2008, -2/+1It's bad enough being badgered for a password when you're the administrator, but TWICE? WTF?

      Seriously, what kind of morons are designing this stuff? This is like the Apple license dialogs that don't have an "Agree" button on them. You press "Continue", and then the thing rolls down ANOTHER panel and protests that you have to AGREE first. Why the hell didn't it present an AGREE button to begin with then?
      • horsepie, on 07/22/2008, -0/+1You seem to have a strong bias again apple. A lot of software makes you scroll to the bottom on the EULA pages. Doesn't mean it isn't a retarded thing to do, though.
  • newbill123, on 07/22/2008, -2/+2Also, I know that the icons for the MP3 previews are designed by engineers this early in the process, but I do hope they change something before release. It looks like eighth notes floating in a murky toilet bowl under a translucent seat.
  • postmodernpilot, on 07/22/2008, -0/+2Sounds good, Ive missed this feature since Ubuntu 8.04 had something like this in their OS.
    • geoken, on 07/22/2008, -0/+1This was part of gnome before 8.04, it was in at least 7.10 if not earlier versions.
  • haentz, on 07/22/2008, -1/+4Can Quickview in Snow Leopard PLEASE support copying from it?
    • Karmavs, on 07/22/2008, -0/+4and can it PLEASE support quick looking at clippings?
      • TastyLamp, on 07/22/2008, -0/+3It's like Apple forgot about clippings or something. No love.
      • pyrates, on 07/22/2008, -1/+1Clippy is making a come back?
  • sej7278, on 07/22/2008, -6/+1linux has had this for years (well at least fedora+gnome, dunno about n00buntu or kde).

    hell, i don't really even have icons anymore, all my excel/openoffice spreadsheets show up as a preview of the data, movies show as a framegrab, mp3's play if you hover over them, images (including pdf and powerpoint) show as a scaled-down version, text/word files show as the first few words....

    wow this must be a slow news day if some old linux feature making it into a new macosx is frontpage news.
    • ilgaz, on 07/22/2008, -0/+4Implementation is totally different, it is a system central technology using quicktime framework.
    • geoken, on 07/22/2008, -1/+2ilgaz, your post makes no sense. The implementation is identical. The underlying framework may be different but it's implemented in the exact same way.
    • lut4rp, on 07/22/2008, -1/+1True... Linux (GNOME using Nautilus) has had it for years. Big deal, Cupertino!

      @ilgaz Nice way of being sarcastic... duh.
    • atgmac, on 07/22/2008, -0/+1Being elitist about distros ("n00buntu") won't help linux gain popularity.
  • ilgaz, on 07/22/2008, -0/+2Interestingly Path Finder already uses quicklook technology for icon previews. I am not totally sure but its "preview" pane could be already using this tactic to preview music/video.
  • timusca, on 07/22/2008, -0/+6This is just one more hurdle to hide porn from someone... before, you could just rename the file to something unsuspecting, but now they don't even have to open the file to see what it is.
  • willynilly, on 07/22/2008, -9/+5Leave it to Apple to dick around with gimmicks like this instead of overhauling the hated Finder once and for all.

    Stuff like this would be fine if they had fixed glaring defects like not being able to create subdirectories, not starting searches in the selected directory, not having an "up one directory level" button...

    And not being able to resize windows from their edges. Good ***** grief, FIX THAT ALREADY. IT'S PATHETIC.
    • lut4rp, on 07/22/2008, -1/+3true, my friend, very true...
    • Rothgarr, on 07/22/2008, -1/+2Agreed. Allow me to resize from any corner/edge.
      Oh, and give me better file options in open/save dialog boxes. I want to rename files, copy/paste them, delete, etc. Just like in Windows.
    • atgmac, on 07/22/2008, -0/+3OS X doesn't have window borders around the whole window like Windows does, so I don't know how you suggest they implement resizing from any corner/edge.
  • digitallysick, on 07/22/2008, -0/+5Tabbed finder damn it! give it to me!
  • Stiles05s, on 07/22/2008, -0/+5QuickLook was already awesome, props to making it better.
  • crispytown, on 07/22/2008, -3/+2Something that linux had now for years. Glad to see the Mac is finally catching up.
    • waluigi14, on 07/22/2008, -0/+2Ubuntu's audio preview feature sucks, though. It randomly starts when you mouse over, but resets unless you keep the mouse over the icon. Useless.
  • IanCurtisZombie, on 07/22/2008, -5/+1My Sharona?? i think this confirms my theory... Mac users are either under 18 or way up 40.
    People between 19-39 (like myself) use Linux...

    Anyways.. It was nice he used My Shaona instead a Jhonas Brothers or that kind of *****...
  • sixlaneve, on 07/23/2008, -0/+2Finally a Digg story that is not iPhone related
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