mc

[Les Mikesell]

Tim wrote:

>>> But that's not it, is it?  It's far more than typing in a command.
>>> Typing ls, or mv, doesn't get me anywhere.  I have to cd to where the
>>> files are, probably do mkdir a few times with a cd or two thrown in.
>>> I've got to come up with a sane wildcard to move a collection of files,
>>> or individually list a slew of files with no commonalities between them,
>>> type in paths to move them too, ad infinitum.
> 
> Les Mikesell:
>> But, but, but... Having a slew of files with no commonalities doesn't 
>> just happen by itself.
> 
> Ooooh yes it does (panto voice)...  You don't get a say in the naming of
> some things, not every file is one that you've created yourself.  Even
> when you do have control, you may not want to similarly name two (or
> more) files that *may* get used together in something else.

I can't think of anything on my computer other than the OS distribution 
where I did not have the choice of the directory where it was stored, 
but in those cases you probably also can't decide by seeing the name in 
a GUI view what the files do have in common or why you'd pick some of 
them for a certain operation.  You'd probably need to let grep or find 
generate a list for you based on something in the files contents or 
attributes.  And then xargs will run a command on each one in the list 
for you.

>>> The fact that Linux has crap GUI file tools, in general, doesn't make
>>> the CLI superior in itself.
> 
>> What's the problem with opening several nautilus windows, 
>> control-clicking a bunch of files in one window and dragging to one of 
>> the others?
> 
> It has little more than browsing features (drag and drop, copy and
> paste).  If you want to actually manage things, you've got to add in
> features all over the place, and put up with the awful un-user-friendly
> right-click menu/properties technique, or resort to using another
> program, as well.  Nautilus is not quick, nor does it make it easy to do
> many file managing tasks (rename, chmod, chown, pattern select, etc.).

"GUIs normally make it simple to accomplish simple actions and 
impossible to accomplish complex actions." --Doug Gwyn (22/Jun/91 in 
comp.unix.wizards)  This has not changed - and probably can't.

-- 
   Les Mikesell
    lesmikesell at gmail.com