Recent places in Finder

[tony359]

Hi all - when the OS opens a Finder window designed to select an item from a browser, I have this very handy "Recent places" which I'd love to have pinned to Finder. I find the available "Recents" folder (which is a smart folder) pretty useless.

Is there a way to make that happen?

Thanks!

 

[BrianBaughn]

You can create your own smart folder with the criteria you desire. I don't know if it will result in what you want, though.

 

[tony359]

I tried the smart folder but it's not the same thing. It will end up containing lots of items and show every single minor folder I have visited.

Recent Folders would only contain the most recently used ones. It's such a great feature I miss from Windows File Explorer to be fair.

 

[BrianBaughn]

I guess I don't understand the distinction of "most recently used ones".

Yes…a smart folder with criteria:

"Kind" is "Folder"
"Last opened date" is "this week"

should contain every folder that's been opened in the last week…as long as they're on a volume that's included in Spotlight.

This can be narrowed down using other search factors.

 

[tony359]

a Smart folder with "recent folder" will show me ALL the recent folders I've opened

"Recent Folders" shows me the MOST USED Recent folders.

As a consequence, a smart folder will list a lot of folders I've visited while "Recent Folders" will show me the ones I keep visiting which I often need to access.

Of course I can pin some of those folders but the beauty of Recent Folders - or the similar Windows option - is that it's dynamic.

Once I stop using a specific folder (because a specific project has completed) the relevant folders will slowly disappear.

 

[bogdanw]

The recent places information is stored in ~/Library/Preferences/com.apple.appkit.xpc.openAndSavePanelService.plist as Bookmark data.
"The bookmark data in the bookmark element is Base64-encoded, so decode the bookmark before using it."
https://developer.apple.com/documentation/professional-video-applications/using-bookmark-data
Only PlistEdit Pro reads it correctly https://www.fatcatsoftware.com/plisteditpro/
I don't think there is a way to convert it into a pinned folder in Finder.

 

[redarm]

a Smart folder with "recent folder" will show me ALL the recent folders I've opened

"Recent Folders" shows me the MOST USED Recent folders.

As a consequence, a smart folder will list a lot of folders I've visited while "Recent Folders" will show me the ones I keep visiting which I often need to access.

Of course I can pin some of those folders but the beauty of Recent Folders - or the similar Windows option - is that it's dynamic.

Once I stop using a specific folder (because a specific project has completed) the relevant folders will slowly disappear.

I guess Finder's "Go > Recent Folders" also doesn't do what you want?

 

[tony359]

Yes it does - it's just a long way from the finder window 🙂

 

[MacGizmo]

Yes it does - it's just a long way from the finder window 🙂

Unfortunately, that menubar item ( Go>Recent Folders ) is just an OS level submenu of individual folder links, not an actual folder, so it can't really even be scripted to add a keyboard shortcut (that I can figure out anyway). You could probably have Claude/Google Gemini/ChatGPT write a script to do what you want, but it may bear no fruit.

There may be a contextual menu modifier utility available that would allow you to add menubar items to the Finder's contextual menus. Try searching on MacUpdate.com to see if can find anything.