Attempt to execute command with macrovariables on command like fails. For example, switch to passive panel and issue cd !#!:;
cd !#!\
Attempt to search by date range fails
New in Far 1.70
Edited from what's new file:
"Smart" associations: If several associations are specified for a single extension, and if some associations have the
"IF EXIST" condition, the action selection menu shows only the items for which the condition is true.
The link creation function (Alt-F6). It works only under Windows NT/2000/XP/Win7
Ctrl-C/Ctrl-Ins - copies the current line from a history menu (Alt-F8, Alt-F11, Alt-F12)
to the clipboard, so it can be edited.
Shift-Enter key can be used in edit controls to insert a file name under cursor from the active panel.
Very useful extension, but it probably should be added to edit control menu -- too many keys to remember.
Pressing the '/','\' in Quick Search will go to directory. Attention: those who used Alt-\ as a macro to pop a Quick
Search window up now can use a Alt-< key.
Functional key bar is extended. It now reacts to three new key combinations - CtrlShift, AltShift,
CtrlAlt. That applies to plugins too.
Ctrl-U removes block in the dialog input lines.
There is a possibility to specify a color for command line prompt, that allows to distinguish prompt from the entered command.
Default color is the same as command line one.
Ctrl-F copies the full file name as it is shown on the panel.
Pressing Shift-F1 in the plug-in configuration menu shows the help topic "Config" for the current plug-in. If there
is no such topic, the standard topic "Contents" is shown instead.
Now the task list (Ctrl-W) is more user-friendly - attempts to move the cursor up from the first item or down from
the last item cause the cursor to move to the last or the first item, respectively.
"Screen grabber" function (Alt-Ins)
The "Show selected first" mode (Shift-F12)
It is possible to set the filler character for the "Wipe file" operation (Alt-Del) (see TechInfo #29).
Alt-Shift-Left, Alt-Shift-Right, Alt-Shift-Home and Alt-Shift-End select the block in the
command line also when the panels are on.
Directories can be deleted when F8 or Shift-F8 is pressed in the tree panel.
Support for the mouse wheel in Windows 2000 and higher
The information panel (Ctrl-L) under Windows shows correct information for symbolic links (directory junctions and
volume mount points) when entering such a directory.
The internal viewer now is used for viewing descriptions. It allows to:
- use word wrap in the description file;
- scroll the description file;
- switch code pages;
- search in the description file (F7).
Display of information about copying speed and time (see TechInfo#26)
Pressing Ctrl-D on the command line deleted the block instead of moving the cursor one character to the right.
Editor
Alt-Shift-F9 invokes the editor settings dialog.
If no block is selected, Alt-U and Alt-I indent the current line.
Viewer
Alt-Shift-F9 invokes the viewer settings dialog.
When the "[x] Save file position" is turned on, the file viewing mode (normal or hex) is stored separately for
each file.
Clicking the mouse on the status line:
- on the code page indicator - shows the code page selection menu
- on the position indicator - shows the "Go to position" dialog
QuickView: Under Windows, when viewing symbolic links, the path to the source directory is shown.
Help
KeyBar in the help system.
New section "Operating system commands".
File attributes
One dialog for any actions.
If multiple file system objects are selected, or if the attributes of
a directory are changed with "Process subfolders" enabled, the check
boxes will have three states:
"[x]" - the attribute is set (or set the attribute)
"[ ]" - the attribute is not set (or clear the attribute) "[?]" - the attribute is undefined (or do not touch the attribute)
[+] For selected objects:
"[x]" - the attribute is set for all objects
"[ ]" - the attribute is not set for all objects "[?]" - the attribute is set for some of the objects
If there are no folders among the selected objects, the option "Process subfolders" will be disabled.
For symbolic links, the attribute setting dialog shows additional information about the source directory (NTFS/Win2K).
In the panel mode 5 (Ctrl-5), if a directory is a symbolic link (Reparse point) (NTFS/Win2K), the letter 'L' will be
shown additionally.
[It is possible to configure distinct colors for symbolic links (NTFS/Win2K) in the "Files highlighting" dialog.
...If you do not want to change the file time, leave the respective field empty. You can push the "Blank" button to clear all
the date and time fields and then change an individual component of the date or time, for example, only month or only minutes.
All the other date and time components will remain unchanged..."
Macros
The look of the key assignment dialog has been changed.
An overwrite warning is shown if a macro already exists, and a warning is shown when trying to delete a macro.
Three new macro areas: "Info", "QView", "Tree",.
4 new modes for panel macro commands:
"NoFilePanels" - cannot be executed in file panels.
"NoPluginPanels" - cannot be executed in plug-in panels.
"NoFolders" - cannot be executed if the current element is a folder.
"NoFile" - cannot be executed if the current element is a file.
By default all the modes are set to off. (The modes are also shown in the macro parameters dialog -Ctrl-Shift-.) See TechInfo#22
for details.
As an experiment, 7 new macro commands have been added: "$Day", "$Month", "$Year", "$Hour", "$Min", "$Sec"
For example "$Year .
$Day . $Month . t x t" macro will generate a
string "2000.21.12.txt" for 21 december 2000. "$MMode" - change macro mode See TechInfo#22 for details.
User menu
If, while editing command in the user menu, the label is not entered
and the "OK" button is pressed, then the dialog is not closed, because it is
possible to lose the commands that may have been entered. To exit the menu
one can use the "Esc" key or the "Cancel" button.
Extension selection
Select files with the same extension as the current file extension Alt-Grey+
Deselect files with the same extension as the current file extension Alt-Grey-
Select files with the same extension as the current file name Ctrl-Grey+
Deselect files with the same extension as the current file name Ctrl-Grey-
New in Far 1.63
New command line option: -u <username> It allows to have separate settings for different users. Can be useful for a
power user to have special setting for two or more different FAR invocations. Settings for non-default users are stored under registry
key HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Far\Users
Shift-Enter key can be used in edit controls to insert a file name under cursor from the active panel.
Very useful extension, but it probably should be added to edit control menu -- too many keys to remember.
New %%S variable in archive support plugin allows to specify place in the command line to insert optional switches.
New in FAR 1.62 (from Whatsnew.txt, slightly edited)
"Search in archives" option is implemented in "Find file" dialog.
Directory names like "dir1\dir2\dir3" are allowed in "Create directory" command. FAR will try to create all directories
of the path.
Internal viewer now can store position in the file:
RightCtrl-0 -- RightCtrl-9store current position in viewed file, Ctrl-0-
Ctrl-9 restore it;
Alt-BS and Ctrl-Z undo position change;
Alt-F8 changes current position.
Press F4 in "Plugin commands" menu to assign hot key to menu item. Hot key can be a letter or a digit. This feature
is designed to simplify access to items of this menu from keyboard macro commands
Plugins can be called from the internal editor. Several such plugins ("Case conversion", "Draw lines", "Auto wrap", "Brackets
matching" and "Align block") are added to the distribution;
In FTP client "Use firewall" option can be specified separately for each site.
"B" and "M" modifiers for "DM", "DC", "DA" column types:
"B" modifier allows to show file time in brief (Unix like) format;
"M" modifier forces usage of text month names.
For example, you may use column type "DMBM" to show file modification time in brief format with text month names.
If "Save file position" viewer or editor option is on and user manually set character table, this table will be restored when
open viewed or edited file next time.
Ctrl-Shift-F3 and Ctrl-Shift-F4 always call internal viewer and internal editor ignoring
file associations.
"!#" modifier specified before file association symbols forces them to refer to the passive panel. For example,
!#!.! denotes a current file name on the passive panel.
"Set "Hidden" attribute to new description lists" option in "File description" dialog.
In archive support plugin 'P' (path only) modifier can be used also with %%A and %%a variables.
Built-in FTP VFS is showing age and behaves very strangely with some FTP servers. Probably an alternative FTP plugin should
be used.
History of visited directories was implemented incorrectly (should be two of them: one for each panel as usually each panel
is used for the specific area of the filesystem or ftp VFS). Also the current implementation is too primitive and does not
allow moving of selected directories into "permanent" favorites list, sorting by name, etc
Built-in editor should support user menu like in mc. All code is already written and just needs to be reused.
Implementation of console command windows should allow scrolling.
F5-F5 should synchronize active and passive panels. Alt-PgDN should open the directory under the cursor
(or archive under the cursor) directory on the passive panel, Alt-PgUp should show the parent directory on the passive
panel as required by OFM2004. You can create macro F2-F5 with content
cd !#!:
cd !#!\
that will do the trick.
It would be nice if you can click with the mouse on current file in the panel information line (last line in the panel) OFM
should select all files with this extension and place extension in the select history list.
It might be beneficial to implement the operation of elimination of duplicates entries from all histories. This is especially
useful for Folders history and without it the folders history in not very usable.
There should be a possibility to hide path in the panelized search view. That helps to find duplicates. Full path can be visible
for the current file only in panel status line (the last line of the panel)
In build 4442, a new functionality "show the number of folders in current
panel" was implemented.
Alongside that, a companion functionality was
added but not documented: when selecting panel items, not only the total
size and number of files is displayed, but also the number of
directories.
Unfortunately, this new feature is HIGHLY annoying in
English version of FAR in the traditional 80x25 view, as all numbers
displayed must take 9 places or less (i.e., 10000 bytes, 10 files and 5
directories is OK, because it takes up 6 ("10 000") + 2 + 1 = 9 places,
but 10000 bytes, 10 files and 10 directories causes overflow and some
information starts to come off the screen. With files larger than 999 999
999 bytes, even a single selected file causes the number of gigabytes to
disappear off the screen, which is EXTREMELY annoying. Is there a way to
disable this functionality?
I can solve that temporarily by editing the
language file (line 942 in build 4444), but I would rather like a
permanent solution. At the very least I would like to propose that the
language string was changed to " %1 bytes (F:%2, D:%3) ".
[Aug 16, 2013] Hotkeys Ctrl-Enter, Ctrl-[, Ctrl-] and so on works in User
menu editing dialog.
First, Far is one of the best OFMs I've ever used. It will be the best if it uses Windows PowerShell as default shell. So far, I
am happy enough that FarNet and PowerShellFar work very well for me. Thank you so much!
Attached are two Macros I put up together and found useful. AltPgUp works the same as Alt-i of MC(4.6.2). AltPgDn simulates Alt-o
of MC. They are not in Addons\Macros of Far installation(2.0 build 981 x86).
Dr. Nikolai Bezroukov also mentioned the kinds of feature in the Suggestions section of his book(ch05/shtml) on OFM at softpanorama.
""""""""""
F5-F5 should synchronize active and passive panels. Alt-PgDN should open the directory under the cursor (or archive under the cursor)
directory on the passive panel, Alt-PgUp should show the parent directory on the passive panel as required by OFM2004.
"""""""""
Please review the appended.
thanks
zhenge
+++++++++++++++++++++
[HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Far2\KeyMacros\Shell\AltPgDn]
"Description"="Use AltPgDn to open the directory under the cursor on the passive panel"
"Sequence"="Tab c d Space Ctrl; Enter Tab Down"
"DisableOutput"=dword:00000001
"NoFiles"=dword:00000001
"NoSendKeysToPlugins"=dword:00000001
[HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Far2\KeyMacros\Shell\AltPgUp]
"Description"="Use AltPgUp to open the parent directory on the passive panel"
"Sequence"="Tab c d Space CtrlShift] Enter Tab"
"DisableOutput"=dword:00000001
+++++++++++++++++++++++
[Nov 17, 2012] Synchronizing active panel with the directory of passive panel can be performed via user menu.
FAR does not have a command "make passive directory equal to active"
which is required by
OFM 1999 standard. While updating OFM1999
standard, I realized that it is possible to imitate this functionality via FAR
user menu. Far uses !# modifier for converting symbol for active panel into symbol for passive panel. Macrovariable for the
current path is !\ and for current drive is !:
So the commands can look like
cd !#!:
cd !#!\
You can do even better then that and synchronize active directory with passive not vise versa by issuing the following sequence
of FAR commands
TAB cd !:; cd !\ Enter TAB
Actually due a bug in FAR this does not work (FAR does not recognize !: and !\ in command line
although it should. But you can
bypass this bug by creating a user menu entry
cd !:
cd :\
and assign it, say, character "=". Then the required macro take the following form:
TAB F2 = TAB
[Nov 13, 2012] Mouse wheel allows browsing history of commands in terminal window.
Generally usage of Mouse wheel is very well thought out in FAR. See help file for details.
MsWheel
You can move a dialog (window) by dragging it with mouse or by pressing Ctrl-F5 and using arrow keys.
Mouse: wheel support
Panels Rotating the wheel scrolls the file list without changing the cursor position on the screen.
Editor Rotating the wheel scrolls the text without changing the cursor position on the screen (similar to Ctrl-Up
/ Ctrl-Down ).
Viewer Rotating the wheel scrolls the text.
Help Rotating the wheel scrolls the text.
Menus Wheel scrolling works as Up / Down keys. It is possible to choose items
without moving the cursor.
Dialogs In dialogs, when the wheel is rotated at an edit line with a history list or a combo box, the drop-down list
is opened. In the drop-down list scrolling works the same as in menus.
You can specify the number of lines to scroll at a time in the panels, editor and viewer (see TechInfo 33).
[Nov 11, 2012] In FAR (no matter what version you use) filter does not work, if you try to select range of dates as a filtering criteria
The implementation is still very raw and undebugged. In a way it is unusable.
But there are two great ideas in FAR implementation:
As filters are named they can be stored. This is great idea as most filters are reused.
You can populated date dialog with today date using special button
[Nov 11, 2012] FAR allows one panel to be full screen and the other half screen. In this case tab essentially expands the
other panel to full screen
This is an interesting consequence of having wide mode and it is also present in MC. I come across it quite accidentally testing
mc for compatibility with OFM1999 standard.
Far Manager has powerful suppport for command history. ConEmu author even
suggests using Far Manager with panels turned off instead of standard command prompt.
Ctrl+E gives you previous command entered. You can press it multiple times to get older entries. Ctrl+X moves you forward in
the history.
Press Alt+F8 to view command history in the list:
You can execute a command from the list by pressing Enter. If you want to edit a command press Ctrl+Enter.
All shortcuts available in command history list:
Enter
Re-execute a command
Shift+Enter
Re-execute a command in a new window
Ctrl+Alt+Enter
Re-execute a command as administrator
Ctrl+Enter
Copy a command to the command line
Del
Clear the commands history
Ins
Lock/unlock a history item
Shift+Del
Delete the current history item
Ctrl+C or Ctrl+Ins
Copy the text of the current command to clipboard
Another useful shortcut is Ctrl+Alt+F – it lets you to search in the list by filtering it down. This shortcut is totally non-obvious
and not documented anywhere so I was happy when I discovered it. It also works in folder history (Alt+F12).
One of the strongest features of Far Manager is the ability to start any program or script from command prompt. You can type
anything there, just like in standard command prompt. Ctrl+Enter shortcut greatly helps here – it inserts selected file name to
command prompt (Ctrl+F inserts full path).
If you launch a console program all program output will be displayed in Far window. Terrific! After program finishes you can
view console output by pressing Ctrl+O.
There is a problem however: you can't scroll up if program output is long. Only last 25 or so lines of text are visible. Anything
before that is lost forever.
Far has a clever little known trick to view all program output. Add view:< before the command and all console output will be
intercepted and redirected to internal viewer. For example:
view:<ipconfig /all
You can even redirect output to Far editor by using
edit:<ipconfig /all
This is nice but not ideal. You have to remember to add view:< before starting a console program or script. If a program takes
long time to execute you won't see any progress until it finishes. Also any interactive prompt in program screws the whole process.
[Nov 10, 2012] ConEmu to the Rescue
ConEmu is a console emulator. It has lots of great enhancements to standard
Windows command prompt. It works by intercepting all console output and displaying it in its own window.
ConEmu is also a close friend with Far Manager. After installing ConEmu you can open Far Manager inside ConEmu window:
Once Far Manager is inside ConEmu tab you can scroll console output by switching to so called alternative mode.
This mode hides Far panels and 'freezes' console. Ctrl+Up scrolls up, Ctrl+Down scrolls down. Scrolling with a mouse wheel also
works.
But that's not all. You can also assign Ctrl+O to view console output in Far viewer. To do this locate CtrlO_View.reg in ConEmu
folder and execute it.
Occasionally I want to edit plain HTML file in Visual Studio. You know, those files with .htm or .html extension. Normally
pressing Enter in Far Manager opens them in a browser. This is what I want most of the time, so let's keep it.
Idea: let's use F4 key to open file in Visual Studio.
Here's how to achieve it:
* Open Commands menu, select File associations.
* Add new association, enter *.htm;*.html as a mask. Enter this command for F4:
"C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Visual Studio 10.0\Common7\IDE\devenv.exe" /edit "!.!"
Change path to devenv.exe if you have different version of Visual Studio.
Note the /edit parameter. It makes Visual Studio to re-use existing window if it is alredy running. Visual Studio is not exactly
a lightweight editor so let's be efficient here.
What if you want to open HTML file in internal Far editor? Simple: press Alft+F4.
Occasionally I launch a program from Far Manager that takes very long to complete. Normally you can use Ctrl+Alt+Tab to "detach"
Far from a running process. Technical note #27 explains
this well:
If a long-running process (for example, archiving) was run in a FAR console, and for some reasons this very instance of FAR
is needed (an editor in the background) or it is undesirable to run a new instance ofFAR, pressing this key combination will
create a new console for FAR where it will continue running as if the process has already ended, and the process will continue
working in the old console.
Unfortunately this doesn't work on Windows 7. Instead of detaching you get Windows task switcher:
Interestingly the switcher is in "sticky" mode. It doesn't disappear when you release keys. You can use arrow keys to select
a window.
The fix is easy:
Start regedit, open HKCU\Software\far2\System key.
Create ConsoleDetachKey string value, set it to some keyboard shortcut. I use CtrlAltX.
Restart Far Manager
To test it try executing this command from Far:
ping google.com -t
Press Ctrl+Alt+X to get back to Far without stopping pings.
...When you finish copying files from and to your USB flash drive you need to safely remove it, otherwise you risk losing data.
Normally you do this by clicking icon with green arrow in system tray:
You can do the same with Far Manager. Open drive menu (Alt+F1 or Alt+F2), select your flash drive and press Shift+Del. You should
get this confirmation:
Select "Remove" and you're done. Note that the key combo (Shift+Del) is different from
ejecting CD/DVD (Del).
Start regedit, open HKCR\Microsoft.PowerShellScript.1\shell\Open\command key
Set it to "C:\WINDOWS\system32\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0\powershell.exe" "-file" "%1" %*
Now you can press Shift+Enter to start PowerShell script in a new window.
As a bonus, you can now double-click .ps1 files in Windows Explorer to launch them. Why is this not a default behaviour? Most
likely Microsoft decided to be extra cautious here.
If you try to open Office 2007 document (.docx or .xlsx) in Far Manager it will simply open them as a ZIP archive. Clearly, that's
not what you want. Here's how to fix it:
Go to Commands › File association.
Create a new association by pressing Ins.
Enter *.doc;*.docx;*.xlsx;*.pptx as a mask.
Enter @"!.!" as Execute command (used for Enter).
You can still open docx file as an archive by pressing Ctrl+PgDn.
In Far Manager 1.70 you could browse folders with mouse wheel. Rotating wheel would scroll up and down. Middle-click would open
a folder. But version 2.0 disables middle-click. Boo! Never take away features from users.
Fortunately it's very easy to restore this functionality:
Launch [C:\Program Files\Far2\Addons\Macros\MiddleClickAsEnter.reg]. If you don't have this folder re-install Far and add
Addons Â" Macros feature.
Sometimes I need to do something with file that Far Manager can't help me with. Good example is changing file permissions. In
these cases Windows Explorer context menu comes handy:
If you want context menu in Far Manager you need EMenu plugin. Fortunately, it is included with Far by default. Here's how to
set it up:
Let's say you use Far Manager and want to launch PowerShell script. With default installation pressing Enter on PowerShell script
in Far Manager will open the script in Notepad. Not very helpful.
Here's how to configure Far Manager to launch PowerShell script by pressing Enter key:
Open Commands menu, select File associations.
Press Ins key to add new association.
Enter *.ps1 as file mask.
Enter the following as execute command:
powershell.exe -file "!.!"
Bonus: how to change colour of PowerShell scripts to green:
Open Options menu, select Files highlighting.
Locate *.exe,*.com,*.bat entry, press Enter to edit.
Far Manager is console-based file manager. I like it very much. Here's how I configure
it to get the maximum out of it:
Set raster font, 10 x 18. Set window size 80 x 26. Turn off selection with mouse (QuickEdit mode).
Turn on "Clear R/O attribute from CD files": go to Options | System Settings. I never need files to be read-only when I
copy them from CD or DVD to hard drive.
Turn on displaying hidden ($) shares: Options | Plugins configuration | Network browser | Show hidden shares. Now I can
type net:computername and see C$, D$, etc.
Options | Confirmations. Turn off confirmations for:
Delete non-empty folders
Exit
Copy these command line archivers to C:\Program Files\Far folder:
pkzipc.exe
rar.exe
MsCab.exe
tar.exe
Unfortunately Far Manager is not bundled with any archiver so you need to get them manually, from various web sites.
Update: see below.
Options | Panel Settings | turn on "Select folders". This allows using NumPad Star to select folders.
Go to Options | Interface Settings. Turn off "Clock in panels". I already have a clock in lower right corner. There is no
need for extra clock.Turn on "Show total copy progress indicator". Otherwise I have absolutely no clue when operation is going
to finish when I have lots of files to copy.
Go to Options | Editor Settings. Check "Del removes blocks". Set tab size to 3. Default 8 is way to much.
Switch to Wide Mode. Press Left Ctrl + 4. I prefer this mode because I can see long file names and file
sizes. Go to Options | File panel modes | Wide mode. Set Column Types to N,SC and Status line column types
to NR,SC,D,T. This adds comma to file sizes:
Install EMenu plugin. Go to C:\Program Files\Far\Plugins\EMenu folder and execute Hotkey.reg. Now I can press
Context Menu key to get Explorer menu for selected file or folder.
Can you read gray text on green background? I can't.
Go to Options | Colors | Dialogs | Unchanged text input. Set Foreground to black.
Update: Download pkzipc.exe, Rar.exe, MsCab.exe, gzip32.exe and tar.exe:
Extract far_archivers.zip to C:\Program Files\Far folder.
The Last but not LeastTechnology is dominated by
two types of people: those who understand what they do not manage and those who manage what they do not understand ~Archibald Putt.
Ph.D
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