Rethinking my original post; I now think I may like MC. Full disclosure follows.
It is possible for a malicious user to name a file so that it looks safe to open, when in fact it may be executable containing dangerous content. For example, a file could be displayed as "readme.txt" in explorer, when it fact it is really named "readme.txt.shs" but since the ".shs" portion of the filename is hidden it is impossible to tell it apart from a simple text file. Then once a user double-clicks to open this file, instead of seeing a text page as expected, the file will be executed by Windows as a scrap object and potentially harm the system.
It is with this in mind why I always do the following (xp):
Double click My Computer, go into Tools, Folder Options, View. I check Show hidden files and folders, and uncheck Hide extensions for known file types and uncheck hide protected operating system files.
Then I search the registry for any instance of "NeverShowExt", & delete each one.
Then I create a new string value called "AlwaysShowExt" in each of the following keys, all of which are in HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT:
batfile
cmdfile
comfile
exefile
scrfile
jsfile
jsefile
vbefile
vbsfile
wsffile
After installing MC, various extensions were no longer on some of the icons on my desktop. Not shown were pdf, txt, zip and flv. Oddly, all the jpg extensions were still showing. Fearing that all my registry settings had changed, I posted to this forum what I posted, then settled down to go into the registry.
However, I found that only the "hide extensions" option in folder properties had changed, which I find to be very insignificant as it's so easy to change back. So I agree that my statement about your product not being safe was silly and unfortunate. Sorry. Really.
I think hidden extensions are dangerous. What I should have said is for some strange reason I had a setting change after installing MC that hid some extensions. After reading your responses I agree that the change must have been some strange response from my particular system. So today I re-installed MC and nope -no change with regards to file extensions.
So, thank you for a very nice looking explorer replacement. I, too, would hope for a 'list' setting ability someday, and maybe to have a way to set shortcuts to be able to quickly go to often used folders. But all in all, it really is a very fine product.
BTW: right under the address bar, to the right of the drop down menu for drives, are 5 icons. The first is the 'show/hide folder tree (Alt+num *)' button.