I am in the process of attempting to switch to Mac as much as possible, with a new MacBook Pro. However, I dont think I will be throwing my PC Laptop out the window any time soon..

I've become more and more impressed with Mac OS in recent years, and felt with the transition to intel chips, the time was right to attempt a switch. Although i've only been at it for a few days, I have to say one of the very first things I missed, was Cut in Finder. Closely followed by Right Click -> New File.

I think several peope in this thread have missed the point of the conversation entirely. No one is enquiring as to your opinion on the validity or usefulness of these functions, they are asking if people are aware of a way to do it.

If you can't accept that there is a need for a function, then you have to accept that others see the need for it. Everyone has their own unique way of operating any type of system, and thats purely down to their own personal tastes and habits. For other users to say "you're doing it wrong" or "thats a stupid way of doing it, why dont you do it my way" is simply shortsighted, and, as others have put it, snooty.

In short, Cut it out. ;) (boom boom!)

Okay, I've just re-read the whole thread and I don't see any instances of people saying that someone is doing things in a "stupid way" or indeed being "snooty".
I think you are misinterpreting what has been said. There is no way to get Finder to do a "cut" operation. So people have been explaining how to get the job done in ways that are supported.

AFACT, this doesnt' work. When I Command+C, Command+Delete a file, it moves to the trash and the Paste option is not available. Gnome, are you using an older version of OS X than 10.4.5? Or am I missing something?

I don't think it would be that hard to write a script that when invoked via Finder would write the currently selected file(s) path(s) to a tmp file. Then using another script that would run 'mv' on the file(s) to the currently selected directory, the files would be moved in a cut/paste fashion.

Problem is that you couldn't assign these to Command+X and Command+V without interrupting the regular Finder behavior for these menu options, so it's not quite the same.

[edit]I'd write up some code for this and post it, but at the moment studying requires my attention and I've distracted myself enough already ;). I'll work on these later if anyone has an interest in them...unless of course someone has already written them.[/edit]

Last Call
 

So, like, did anybody end up writing a script that FIXES Finder?

I want to cut and paste... I don't care if my mouse has two buttons or not, just give me the X! :p

I think you mean did anyone write a script like that described by Quantum0726 - such a script would supply a way to do a "cut" operation via a contextual menu or some other keystroke - it wouldn't "fix Finder" in the sense of making it behave like Windows as to "cut" operations.

The trouble is that such a script has to be written very carefully as there is likelihood of data loss if the script doesn't take account of all the possibilities. So writing such a script is more difficult than usual.

I managed to come up with an Applescript that should emulate the 'Cut' behavior of Windows in Finder.

As hayne said, "there is likelihood of data loss if the script doesn't take account of all the possibilities." I'd like to think I wrote this script very carefully, but I really haven't tested it very well and haven't spent too much time coming up with every possible situation/error trap.

I'll attach the code if anyone wants to try it (md5 sum is 29d46d480b58dee04b59ca053718a00c), but I warn you that there is a possibility that the script won't function properly, and since it uses the 'mv' command, files could easily be moved to the wrong places or deleted altogether. USE WITH CAUTION!

You can also grab the code (and any updates whenever they come) from my site at http://www.kempinger.homelinux.net/p...sinFinder.html.

As always suggestions and bug reports are welcome.

Whoops... Had an error with the moving to the same folder trap. Should be fixed now. Md5 sum is 57e147877076833d03c0c40207a4dec7.

I actually do see where you're coming from. The thing to understand, however, is that your job where you manage over 40,000 files makes you the exception. The vast majority of Mac users, myself included, don't need that functionality. I mean, I do web design (with PHP) and I never find myself saying "You know, I really wish there was a shortcut for creating a new blank text file." Now, when I am on Windows (a rare thing since I left MS) I sometimes use that "New text document" shortcut, but that's just because it's a pain in the ass to navigate the Start menu to Notepad. What I'll usually do instead, though, is just add Notepad to my Quick Launch bar. In the same way, I always add TextEdit to my Dock in OS X. Because when you launch either application, you automatically get a new blank document. Most people save files after they've put something into it. It's not that the way you do things is wrong, it's just that it's not the normal way that people do things.

But here's where Macs are great. See, you have a specific need; one which is easily met on a Mac. Thanks to Script Editor and OS X's UNIX underpinnings, a quick .app file was whipped up that runs in the background (a Dock icon doesn't even appear) and creates a file called "Untitled.txt" in whatever the current folder is via the touch shell command. Just plop the app in your Utilities folder, and then drag it to the Finder's Toolbar, and you have a shortcut you can click at any time to do exactly what you want.
The rest of us, however, don't need to have their GUI cluttered up with an extraneous command that we'll never use. And in fact, doing it this way actually is faster than on Windows: no need to right click and scroll down to the "New" menu and then scroll down to "Text document" and clicking it. Instead, whenever you want to create a new blank text file in the current folder, you just click the button in the Toolbar. :)

And something just as useful as the tools built-in to the OS are the Mac community: I put the app on my .Mac web space for anyone to download. (not like I have much use for it otherwise, since I have my own web server) http://homepage.mac.com/melchizedek/...ewtextfile.zip

As far as moving files in the Finder goes, I usually just Command-drag. Ever since we got spring-loaded folders back in OS X, it's just been the way I do it. It's fast and easy.

-ian

I've been a strict Mac user for more than 2 decades. I admit there are some Mac users that think it is holier than thou. anyway ...

It is a bit of a bummer the Finder doesn't have the cut and paste function of Windows. It would certianly make it a bit easier for Windows users to adapt to the Mac system. I do not expect having the function would be complicated to implement.

If nothng else, try QuickAccess. It offers similar functionality through a contextual menu. It isn't perfect, but it's pretty good.

I've got it under MacOS 8.6 :)

Not just Finder Cut, but also Cut (Append) and Copy (Append) as well as Copy and Paste, of course.

Yeah, 3rd party, of course. (A contextual menu item add-on).

No, my main computer doesn't run 8.6, it runs 10.4.8; but yeah, I really do use the 8.6 box nearly every day at work.

Okay, so, for those of you looking to use a cut function the way it works in windows (in essence, a cut and then a paste, which moves the files) there's really a simple solution I'm surprised nobody's mentioned.

If you grab the files you want and drag them to where you want them to go, and before you drop them, press the command button, and then drop them, instead of copying to the new location, they will be moved there, removing them from the old location.

As has been stated, if you're moving them on teh same volume, this is not needed, as they will move by default, but if you're trying to move them from one volume to another, this is the ideal way to accomplish this.

This works in 10.3 and 10.4... those are the only versions of Mac OS I've used since my original blue monochrome mac plus died and was replaced by a dos5/win3.0 system... ran windows and eventually migrated to linux, and could never afford to get a mac again until recently. Sure glad that the ipod has spawned the second coming of apple so that I could afford a new mac :D

Is there a way to enable the cut/copy/paste in the Finder? How many times I may have put a file in the wroong place, and just to be able to undo such actions, etc, would be awesome.

Would be a great wasy to get PC people converted. Seems like a logical thing to implement.

I wish Apple would just think of the user more often. So many people help with their time to do the most basic things ...

I'm too lasy to read all 3 pages, but you can have one Finder window and drag-and-drop while holding the Option key to copy...

Press Command+Z...

And why has this topic been raised from the dead 3 times?

I would love to see this (a Windows-like Cut-Paste function) in the next version of OS X.

It is pretty much the only thing that I miss from the good ol' PC-days.

My personal way of navigating back then was to use a single windows with detailed list view and the keyboard to manage most of my navigation (Enter & Backspace for folder navigation and Copy-Paste, Cut-Paste for file management).

If not added by Apple, maybe someone skilled could develop such a thing?

You all might want to try http://www.growlichat.com/NuFile.php if your still looking for the right click new blank file action.

Decided to look into this a little, and found commands that will let you do it. I use these through the contextual menu from On My Command:

These commands written By Fredrik Andersson (fan@gaffophone.com), 2003-11-05

Not by me, I'm just passing them along.
My right click menu:
http://www.imagedumpwitheasy.com/uploads/1a93f90384.png

Indeed big deal, be-ing a switcher this is by far the most irritating thing there is. Now i always have to go into terminal do do this, or have to install shareware to do the job.

Apple should just implement it into the next version.


Cutting in the way described below should just works fine and should be very clear to anybody

- I select file, hit APPLE-X
- The file gray's out, but is not deleted (difference with text, but you could delete it and move it into something called 'file clipboard or so..' apple is inventive enough for this).
- If i now move into another folder and hit APPLE-V the file will be copied, and deleted.
- You can't paste twice, as the original file is now moved.

Same goes for folders. This works just fine for all those 100000000's of windows, and unix users.
Now tell me what is the difference between files and text! Everybody works like this with text, so why not with files.

If you overwrite a file, this file should go into the trascan (missing in windows and unix; could be very unique for mac!)

It's a real missing feature in OSX that finder can not cut, and seeing all the shareware that do make this possible it would be very wise voor Apple to put it into there new upcomming OS.

For users of external drives and such, the "cut command" in Windows is very handy. It is truly inconsistent with the traditional and standard definition of "cut" which does remove the selection immediately. But that doesn't matter. It does what it should and I applaud Microsoft for one-upping Apple on that one. My students use this feature with the speed of light and it always amazes me that they can move files from one drive volume to another so quickly and not have to slow themselves down with delete commands.

Incidentally, the base UNIX has this function in it's most consistent style but it is called "move". It is not very fast since it is command line but you just navigate to the directory of the file and type:
mv filename newdirectory

Where "newdirectory" is the place you want the file to go. The file will disappear from its first location and appear in the new location instantaneously. All we need now is a Finder plugin (I'm sure that's not the correct term) that can add this feature to the GUI. Let's hope it becomes an option (default off, if you think it is too scary) for 10.5.

Command-drag between drives moves the file. You can nit pick and find specific situations where the Windows way is better than the Mac way for almost any kind of task, but if you're going to do that, shouldn't you be using Windows?