I've been wondering about a way to visually compare multiple folders & contents.
My want is a virtual container/folder that allows me to delete entries in the source folders, without them being physically present in the same physical dir.
I want to virtually merge to show all folders/files so I can weed out the duplicates &/or older versions.
Windows virtual folders (search) is restricted to files AFAIK, so the search result compares only contents as a 'virtual folder'.
I tried MC search with wildcards etc but results weren't 100% as the search terms pre-define what I see & I could easily skip an entry if my search template wasn't perfect.
What can be done if:-
Multiple folders of similar name with contents of similar names + different timestamps/versions & duplicates in nested folders e.g.
<folder 1>
file1.abc
file2a.abc
file3.abc
\<folder 1.2>
file1.abc
file2a.abc
file3.abc
<folder 2>
file1c.abc
file2c.abc
file3a.abc
<folder 3>
file1b.abc
file2.abc
file3.abc
\<folder 3>
file1b.abc
file2.abc
file3.abc
I could just copy everything into a common folder, but that isn't fool-proof & uses up a lot of disk space.
I could make lists of dirs & then merge these to review contents - but time-consuming.
Can MC be made to do this?
Any ideas or tools that allow me to do this kind of thing? I haven't found a Comparison prog that does exactly what I want, great for specific file changes but for a fuzzy review of 5+ dirs & sub-dirs, not so much.
MC do not have Virtual folders yet.
Some kind of virtual folders/devices is planned. And it is very high up on my list. However it is a very large feature. And I have not had time to design it and investigate everything that need to be changed to support it, yet.
OK thanks Mathias. 8)
I can see that there would be a lot of variables to consider. I guess a plug-in could give the most flexible approach & would reduce the number of core changes to MC...?
no, core support for virtual folders is needed for some other features that are planned
You will be busy then!!!
Looking forward to the new roadmap :D