Dragging and Dropping vs. Selecting?

[ramparts]

Okay, I've had a MacBook (first Apple computer) for a few months now and still I'm unable to figure out how to know when, if I hold down the mouse over a file in Finder and drag around, it will drag/drop the file or select more files, except that it seems whichever one I want to do is the one it doesn't do. It gets especially annoying to try dragging a group of files, only to find that Finder decided to get rid of my selection and start highlighting new files instead. So, what's the deal? How do I do each of these things? What's the way it tells what to do? Thanks!

 

[portent]

Normally, it works the same way as Windows or any other system does.

I hold down the mouse over a file in Finder and drag around, it will drag/drop the file

Yes. Period. (Fullstop.) Just like Windows.

On the other hand, if you hold down the mouse when the pointer is not over a file, you will see a band box (a transparent reactangle) just like on Windows, that will select anything within the range

Except for Column View, which is an odd feature from NeXT that doesn't follow the rules. Column View behaves differently depending on whether you're in the leftmost pane (in which case it mostly works the normal way, except with an invisible band box) or any of the other panes (in which case drags will always select. (?!!!))

Column View is a NeXT invention, so you might just want to stay out of it if you're into UI consistency.

 

[ramparts]

Thanks...I use List/Cover Flow view. Should have mentioned that before. It looks like it might be highlighting when I'm in that tiny bit of space between files. Weird.