ross-patterson / portals-desktop-organization Goto Github PK

I use a lot the "open file location" function in the context menu a lot. This option opens the portal folder where my shortcut is and I need to open the shortcut's folder, see ?

I have an idea and here's an image to illustrate it :

Why not add an option to open the Windows context menu of the item ? It would be great !

Thanks for your work, it's a great soft that you've done.

Describe the bug
I cannot move files/folder within each portal.
I'm trying to put a file in a different position in a portal, and I cannot.

To Reproduce
I don't how how to reproduce this error.
I might be the only one experiencing this.
I used to be able to move files/folders within each portal, but now I cannot.

Expected behavior
When I try to move a file/folder within a portal, it should move to a different position.

Screenshots
n/a

Desktop (please complete the following information):
Windows 10 Enterprise version 20H2

I'm currently using Stardock Fences and am looking for an alternative. They have a feature that auto hides the desktop icons and "Fences" when not in use (time adjustable). Is this something that could be added to Portals?

Describe the bug
The user's desktop normally also shows icons on the public desktop. Moba XTerm, which can be installed freely, is one of those. Moving it results in "out of memory"

To Reproduce
Steps to reproduce the behavior:

1. Install Moba XTerm (https://mobaxterm.mobatek.net/)
2. Move the MobaXterm icon to a portal
3. See error

Expected behavior
It should be moved after asking for permissions

Screenshots

Desktop (please complete the following information):

• OS: Windows 10

Describe the solution you'd like
I'd like to be able to adjust the icon size for each portal rather than changing it globally. There are overrides for most other customizations but not the icon size.

Additional context
This feature is available on nimi places, I attached an example of it. I switched to Portals because of nimi places randomly crashing, Portals seems much more stable and customizable with this being the only exception

Maybe I'm not really thinking out of the box (no pun intended) but do you think you would be able to add a minimize button to the main settings window? When I'm tailoring the different portals, I have to move the settings window down to the bottom of my screen, so I can see what I'm working on. I think it would just be helpful to be able to minimize it like a typical Windows form.

Hi again,

Thanks for autofocus show/hide feature. And again I have an idea.

Maybe will be great when on showing or hiding panel will be animation when panels are showing down or up. In JavaScript this is an "ease" parameter in transition - most linear.

I mean for example when I put my cursor on titlebar - panels is showing, but it is super fast on/off. But maybe great idea is add animation on that function.

Check this out!

Describe the bug
Right-clicking an icon normally brings up the icon-specific menu (Open, Open File Location, etc...). If you right click near the edge of the icon, it brings up the background menu (new, paste) instead, even though the icon is still highlighted.

To Reproduce
Steps to reproduce the behavior:

1. Have a Portal with one or more icons
2. Hover over an icon
3. Right click near the edge (but inside) of the highlighted box around the icon
4. BUG: Background menu is opened

Expected behavior
Right clicking anywhere inside the highlighted box for the icon should present the icon's right-click menu, not the backgrounds. Alternatively, shrinking the highlighted box to fit the bounds of the right-click "hitbox" would also work.

Screenshots

Desktop (please complete the following information):

• OS: Windows 10 Pro 21H2

Describe the bug
When you open and close a folder the header starts moving.

To Reproduce
You have to have the Header of a Folder at the bottom and then just open and close it to see the bug

Expected behavior
Opening and closing without moving the header

Screenshots

Desktop (please complete the following information):

• OS: Windows 10
• Browser Edge

Is your feature request related to a problem? Please describe.
I like having a clean desktop, but I also like having icons for access.

Describe the solution you'd like
The ability to hide the portals and desktop icons via double-clicking on the desktop. Stardock Fences has this feature.

Describe alternatives you've considered
An alternative/extra to this would be to allow a hotkey assignment for hiding the icons and portals.

Describe the bug
A clear and concise description of what the bug is.

To Reproduce
Steps to reproduce the behavior:

1. Go to '...'
2. Click on '....'
3. Scroll down to '....'
4. See error

Expected behavior
A clear and concise description of what you expected to happen.

Screenshots
If applicable, add screenshots to help explain your problem.

Desktop (please complete the following information):

• OS: [e.g. iOS]
• Browser [e.g. chrome, safari]
• Version [e.g. 22]

Smartphone (please complete the following information):

• Device: [e.g. iPhone6]
• OS: [e.g. iOS8.1]
• Browser [e.g. stock browser, safari]
• Version [e.g. 22]

Additional context
Add any other context about the problem here.

Is your feature request related to a problem? Please describe.
Just a feature that could be neat for additional customization.

Describe the solution you'd like
It would be great to allow users to be able to change the appearance of their portals with PNG or JPEG images-- one for the title bar, and one for the contents background. There should also be the option to stretch, tile or position the image. I realize this may come at the cost of extra system resources, but there could always be a warning for such if that ends up being the case.

The icon for Modern apps (installed via the Microsoft Store) appear blank white when in a Portal.

Can you add support for this type of app?

Describe the bug
If Portals is running as the current user, right clicking a program icon in a portal and choosing "Open File Location" causes an unhandled exception error and Portals then crashes. If portals is run as administrator, this does not occur.

To Reproduce
Steps to reproduce the behavior:

1. Run portals (not as administrator)
2. Create a portal with an icon for an app located in Program Files or another "protected" folder
3. Right click the icon and choose "Open File Location"
4. BUG: Portals crashes with an error message

Expected behavior
The location that the icon/shortcut refers to is opened in a new explorer window without crashing.
An alternative would be to require/request Portals to have administrator access by default, so that there are no issues accessing protected folders

Additional context
Log file is attached. Error says the issue is a permissions issue accessing a folder/file.

portals_crashlog_2022-08-07_20-52-16_1186590.log

Currently, when attempting to drag and drop a file from a Portal directly into a Discord window, it is greeted with a red circular 'not allowed' cursor and the process is not carried out (also when running Portals as admin). The function however works in explorer and in web browsers.

Describe the bug
I don't know what happened. After Windows update, it just crash in a few seconds after launching. I couldn't find a log that can help me to figureout what's going on.

To Reproduce
Steps to reproduce the behavior:

1. Update Windows 10 (?)

Expected behavior
A normal no crash launch

Desktop (please complete the following information):

• OS: Windows 10 Build 19043.1706

Not a big deal, but when opening zip files, they get opened in the native file explorer, instead of the designated app as always.

This occurs only from Portals (and not if I open the file from the Windows file explorer)

Is your feature request related to a problem? Please describe.
At the time being, any new file that is being created or pasted onto the Desktop does not automatically get added to a portal. Just like with Fences, it would be lovely if a file, folder or program shortcut would auto-move itself to a folder specified.

Describe the solution you'd like
Some rule-based settings would be awesome, so I could specify that e.g. files always get added to Portal 1, folders auto-move to Portal 2, and program shortcuts land in Portal 3.

Describe alternatives you've considered
I could only think of configuring my screenshot app to auto-store its created files in a portal's Desktop folder, but that would not help for any items created by setup programs which I cannot control, and would also make pasting files or folders onto my Desktop mindlessly and still have them auto-appear in a portal impossible.

Additional context
Since you're relying on actual folders to store content in portals, this might possibly be difficult to achieve, as contrary to Fences, elements would have to be moved physically to a portal = sub-folder on a Desktop.

Describe the bug
Portals crashes if user clicks No or clicks the X at the top right of the User Account Control dialog that asks "Do you want to allow this app to make changes to your device?"

To Reproduce
Steps to reproduce the behavior:

1. Make sure Windows User Account Control settings are set to at least the second "Always notify" level ("Notify me only when apps...")
2. Add an icon to a portal window for a program that requires administrator permissions (right-click shortcut and select Properties > Shortcut > Advanced... > Run as administrator)
3. Run program from portal window.
4. When User Account Control window opens, click "No".
5. Portal crashes and creates crashlog.

Expected behavior
Nothing should happen if user clicks No on User Account Control window.

Desktop (please complete the following information):

• OS: Windows 11

portals_crashlog_2022-09-04_15-36-27_1851348.log

HI, one feature which is not available is auto hidding when cursor is on it (focused). This is very helpful.

Is your feature request related to a problem? Please describe.
As your portals depend on physical folders, by default these folders show beside the actual folders.

Describe the solution you'd like
An option to hide the actual folders for the portal, so I only see my portals and possible stray elements that I didn't throw into them.

Describe alternatives you've considered
No idea :) .

Portals is definitely awesome!
I would like to suggest to implement a feature to save relational position of a portal.
Why? I do create a portal at top right edge with X coordinate 2000 on 4K screen with 150% scaling. Later I do connect to that machine via Remote Desktop with FHD screen and 100% scaling - the portal is outside of the screen and the only way to get it back is to manually adjust X coordinate.
Later on when I switch back to 4K screen - the portal appears in the middle of the screen.

Would be nice to have a feature of X/Y coordinate to be set as a relative value like (0.9 of screen width), or implement an automatic recalculation based on scaling and screen dimensions.

Describe the bug
I have a portal with a lot of steam game icons that does not show up properly.

To Reproduce
Steps to reproduce the behavior:

1. Create a portal
2. Add steam game icons to the portal

Expected behavior
Icons are displayed properly for the actual game.

Screenshots

Desktop (please complete the following information):

• OS: Windows 11 Build 22616.1 (22H2)
• Version 2.1.0.4

Additional context
I have also tried Use Alternate Icon Retreival Method

Keep up the good work. Your portals are incredibly faster compared to Stardock Fences. They might become my favorite portal system.

Is your feature request related to a problem? Please describe.
A clear and concise description of what the problem is. Ex. I'm always frustrated when [...]

Yes. I have a very simple portals setup. apps on the top games on the bottom special and misc on the sidee and every time i create a new portal newly added icons go behind the portal while on apps like for expample stardock's fences they would get moved

Describe the solution you'd like
A clear and concise description of what you want to happen.
make it so if a portal is in the way of an icon the icon gets moved away to it can be then dragged wherever by the user

Describe alternatives you've considered
A clear and concise description of any alternative solutions or features you've considered.
make icons behind a portal draggable or have an option where newly created desktop icons get moved inside a portal by default

Additional context
Add any other context or screenshots about the feature request here.

(the issue) look behind the apps portal

describe issue

1. custom the default templates in settings = OK.
2. custom portal that has been created on desktop = ISSUE.

• I do change some context of the portal, such as: changing the color of the content, changing the content foreground area color,..and so on.
• I expect the chosen color bar to be normal but it usually doesn't appear and starts some crashes, lagging because it causes memory to get higher and higher until the overflow of RAM in seconds.

the laptop I use:

• MSI Modern 15.
• chip Ryzen 7 5700U.
• RAM 8GB.
• Windows 11 Pro.
  Sorry for my bad English.

It would be great to be able to lock the title text for editing, so when clicked on it would expand the portal instead of editing the name.

I also think the ability to center the title text would be excellent.

When clicking on the "back to desktop" icon in the bottom right corner, if I click on one of my portals, it disappears and reappears after my second click so I can't interact with it.

HERE'S A GIF:

• The problem only appears on the left portal and
• The problem disappears after reopening any window

My report isnt finished I need to try to reset the soft to defaults and rebuild my portals to see if the problem comes back but I'm too lazy for the moment...

When having more than one portals on the desktop, sometime clicking on the portal that was created last would make that portal disappear. This happened after user was doing something else for a while, and came back to select a file on that portal.
This would not happen on any other Portal.

This faulty behavior would go away if I opened the Portal setting windows.

Video of me clicking on the portal to make it disappears
https://photos.app.goo.gl/rAYHY3f8u46s8Yko6

Describe the solution you'd like
It would be great if we could link already existing folders to a new or existing portal. This would especially be great for users who are constantly working in other directories, such as office workers, programmers, modders and artists.

Describe the bug
Despite the changelog for v2.1.0.3 listing > Portals will no longer minimize when Win+D is pressed (Show Desktop), Win+D minimizes all portals. It may have something to do with Win10's multiple desktops feature? When I had another desktop open, Win+D makes them all disappear on Desktop 1, but appear on Desktop 2.

Expected behavior
Would be nice to have "Double Click on the desktop to show/hide all portals", similar to how Fences does it. I've also often wished the context menu on a portal would give an option to open the management UI.

Desktop (please complete the following information):

• OS: Win10 v1709
• Browser: Ungoogled Chromium
• Version: Portals v2.1.0.4

Describe the bug
Using "show desktop" button on far right side of taskbar, or show desktop shortcut (win+D) shows desktop but portals are hidden.
Opening any program then causes portals to reappear (eg opening explorer, spotify, whatever).

To Reproduce
Steps to reproduce the behavior:

1. Show desktop via taskbar button or Win+D

Expected behavior
Desktop shows with portals visible.

Desktop (please complete the following information):

• OS: Windows 10
• Version: 21H1

Other than that I have no issues and the software is excellent, cheers!

Portals is awesome. I would like to request some features.

• Add Cut option when right clicking on a file in a portal
• When deleting multiple files from portal, now the Windows delete confirmation box would show up for for each individual file. It should be that only one confirmation be shown for all the files deletion.

Thank you very much. Keep up the good work.

Ongart

I have set desktop items to backup with OneDrive. I created a new folder/portal on desktop and moved a desktop item to that portal. I then got a sync issue in OneDrive.

I checked the permissions of the desktop shortcut and noticed they were different. It turns out the item I moved to the portal was from public desktop (all users). OneDrive doesn't backup items from public desktop, but now the item was moved from the public desktop to my desktop because the containing folder/portal is on my desktop. Also if I move the item back from the portal to the desktop it still stays on my desktop and is not moved back to public desktop where it originated.

I realize that this is not really a problem for the function of the Portals, but it could be solved with an additional feature in Portals. Make an option to change the permissions for items moved from public desktop to portals on my desktop.

Is your feature request related to a problem? Please describe.
Not related to a problem.

Describe the solution you'd like
I would like to be able to:

-Double click the desktop to hide all portals

Describe alternatives you've considered
A clear and concise description of any alternative solutions or features you've considered.

• Assign a hotkey to hide/unhide all portals

Additional context
Add any other context or screenshots about the feature request here.
As you may be aware of the original requests to hide portals, Stardock Fences allows you to double-click the desktop. The current implementation in Portals is either to hide all from the main portals home menu or to individually hide each portal. It would be more efficient to allow for double-clicking the desktop or assigning a hotkey to hide/unhide all portals.

Is your feature request related to a problem? Please describe.
While organizing my desktop icons or adding a new shortcut, I often need to rename them. I can right-click an select rename, but that's a pain if using the keyboard instead of the mouse to navigate.

Describe the solution you'd like
When an icon in a portal is selected, hitting F2 should show the input for renaming the icon.

Additional context
This is a standard Windows Explorer hotkey, so it would be really great if Portals supported it as well.

Is there any way for compatibility with Quicklook which opens a preview of files files and folders like in MacOS. Folders and files in Portals do not currently work with Quicklook. Many thanks and have a pleasant day.

Link to QuickLook github page: https://github.com/QL-Win/QuickLook

Hi Ross,

I installed your software on a computer in my organization. Due to the firewall I can't verify my license. Is it possible to verify the license offline?
Or could you kindly name the URL which is necessary to add to the firewall exceptions?

Thank you for your help.

Would it be possible to include a feature that allowed you to browse the folder in portal instead of opening a new window in file explorer when opening folder etc inside of the portal? An example would be how folder portals work in Stardocks Fences 4. Many thanks and have a pleasant day.

I am aware that a cut function isn't currently available.

This is due to the complexity of notifying external applications that the cut has been completed, or Portals getting a notification that an external paste from a cut has been completed.

Cut/Paste between portals is easy, but that may cause confusion as people will try to cut and paste to other apps and see it as a bug when it doesn't work...

Describe the solution you'd like
Maybe something more in-line with a long-term goal, but it would be nice to be able to hover one's cursor over certain objects, and for a pane to appear that shows the contents of a folder and other certain types of objects.

Additional context
Preview sizes should be customizable, but should default to no larger than 256x256. Folder preview panes should allow for scrolling, and should also apply to folder shortcuts.

Another option on the folder part is to create a Windows style menu (a la pre-Windows Vista) that allows users to go deeper into a directory.

Is your feature request related to a problem? Please describe.
No problems or bugs so far.

Describe the solution you'd like
If not already implemented, I would like to see a 'shutters' method to the portals. Using my specific example, I have six portals grouping desktop icons. When each are closed and stacked atop each other (like pallets on a warehouse floor) I would like to be able to click one and have it expand in the space and move the others in the stack. When minimized, that open portal would collapse into its closed space and move the other closed portals back into a stack. I do not expect to open more than one or two in the stack at a time.

If you'll forgive the Harry Potter example - this would be like 12 Grimmauld Place moving 11 and 13 aside to make room for the Black Townhouse when the Fidelius Secret was revealed...

Is this possible to do?

Describe alternatives you've considered
I've considered lining up portals along the top as a wanna-be titlebar, but that doesn't quite do it. It 'works' but doesn't have the same effect. Possibly if each portal in a stack was considered a 'link' to each other in the manner of a chain pulling up or letting down, maybe that would work.

Additional context
Add any other context or screenshots about the feature request here.

Thank you!

Is your feature request related to a problem? Please describe.
Moving portals around the desktop is easy enough, but aligning them in a grid can be difficult. It usually involves opening a calculator and figuring out the correct size & position for each portal, then typing them in manually.

Grid snapping on the desktop would be handy for aligning your portals without having to fiddle with each portal as much.

Describe the solution you'd like
In the Portals window (maybe under 'Home' or the top of 'Settings'), there would be a few settings next to each other:

• Enable Grid Snapping
• Grid Width (Pixels)
• Grid Height (Pixels)
• Grid Horizontal Offset (Pixels)
• Grid Vertical Offset (Pixels)
• Grid Anchor Location:
  • Top Left (default), Top Right, Bottom Left, Bottom Right

The grid offsets are useful in case you want your portals on a 32x32 grid, but distanced from the edge of the screen by 8px to account for the taskbar, the current wallpaper, or something else.

With a grid size of 64x64 and an offset of 32x32, the grid would act like this:

(the grid doesn't need to be visualized)

With an offset of 96x96 or even 672x672, the grid would still act like that. This may not be ideal for everyone but I think it's OK enough for most use cases; it will just be a little inconvenient starting the grid in the middle of your screen.

The grid anchor location can also be changed, though this isn't necessary and only saves a little math for users who want the grid to start from a different corner of the screen. The coordinate system in Portals starts from the top left. This doesn't change; the grid anchor location only affects how grid snapping works.

Example behavior:
(the code isn't exact, just illustrates that the other anchor modes require grid snapping to factor in window size as well)
Regular snapping: (window_pos.x + grid_offset.x + grid_size.x / 2) % grid_size.x
Inverted snapping: (window_pos.x - grid_offset.x - grid_size.x / 2 + window_size.x) % grid_size.x

• Top left anchor (default):
  • Window X position: regular snapping
  • Window Y position: regular snapping
• Top right anchor:
  • Window X position: inverted snapping
  • Window Y position: regular snapping
• Bottom left anchor:
  • Window X position: regular snapping
  • Window Y position: inverted snapping
• Bottom right anchor:
  • Window X position: inverted snapping
  • Window Y position: inverted snapping

Describe alternatives you've considered
It's not hard to pull out/open a calculator and do these calculations by hand, but grid snapping would save time and be handy for organizing your desktop portals.

I saw this issue (#32) explaining relative window positioning. While it is useful (and I might redesign my portals with it in the future), it's a little different from grid snapping.

Additional context
n/a

Option to auto-update, or delay updates until I click the button manually. This would really clean up my boot process, it's been several times now that this has been the first thing on my pc. I'm not turning it on to do maintenance. I'm turning it on to use it.

Describe the bug
After creating a portal with a title bar name and locking it you can still click on the title bar name and edit it. This causes unexpected behaviour when you have selected the option to allow any part of the title bar to expand the portal.

To Reproduce
Steps to reproduce the behavior:

1. Create portal with a title bar name
2. Change setting to allow any part of the title bar to expand the portal
3. Lock the portal
4. Click the area of the title bar where the portal name is and instead of expanding the portal it puts the portal name in edit mode

Expected behavior
After locking the portal the title bar name should not be editable and should simply expand the portal when clicked.

Desktop (please complete the following information):

• OS: Windows 11
• Version 2.1.0.4

Describe the bug
A clear and concise description of what the bug is.

To Reproduce
Steps to reproduce the behavior:

1. Go to '...'
2. Click on '....'
3. Scroll down to '....'
4. See error

Expected behavior
A clear and concise description of what you expected to happen.

Screenshots
If applicable, add screenshots to help explain your problem.

Desktop (please complete the following information):

• OS: [e.g. iOS]
• Browser [e.g. chrome, safari]
• Version [e.g. 22]

Smartphone (please complete the following information):

• Device: [e.g. iPhone6]
• OS: [e.g. iOS8.1]
• Browser [e.g. stock browser, safari]
• Version [e.g. 22]

Additional context
Add any other context about the problem here.

Hi there,
thank your for developing this wonderful app!

Have you thought about implementing something that would prevent the portals from overlapping each other and snap to an invisible grid for a more uniform look?

Also, as a little extra, it would be awsome if the boxes could attach to each other vertically so that when you fold up one box, the others below would automatically follow and slide up to close the gap.

Keep up the great work!
Regards - el-ef

PS: In case you need a translator for german, just leave me a notice. :)

Is your feature request related to a problem? Please describe.
I find it annoying that the default location of the folder is on the desktop.

Describe the solution you'd like
What the portal ought to do is create that folder inside the user's AppData (Local or Roaming) by default.

Ross wonderful job with Portals, used Fences before and was way slower/clunkier. So this is like a breath of fresh air on my desktop.

If I could make a suggestion for improvement it would be some kind of icon caching mechanism to make initial loading faster. I have a portal/folder with some 90 items and it takes some seconds to load when I first login.

Is your feature request related to a problem? Please describe.
So my setup is 2 a laptop and a monitor. My monitor is larger than the laptop screen, whenever I unplug the HDMI, to use the laptop on its own, the portals keep the same settings (x,y coordinates/resolution) , so some of them are off the screen cut off, since my monitor is bigger. Also the picture quality is way worse as they keep the resolution of the other screen.

Describe the solution you'd like
The portals to adapt when the screen is changed. So like they have a different layout depending on which screen is used.

Additional context
Here you can see what happens when I unplug my HDMI: