Toggling Visibility of Many Files

[tyrannitar]

Hello everybody,

Is there an application I can acquire to toggle the visibility of many files at once? I would prefer something equivalent to checking a box yes/no as in Windows. I've tried a couple of applications, but they either slow down when I try to do the number of files I need, or they can only change them one at a time. Thanks!

 

[mysterytramp]

An AppleScript might be your best option.

mt

 

[mysterytramp]

This will hide the files you drag onto it:

on open fileList
	
	set tid to AppleScript's text item delimiters
	set AppleScript's text item delimiters to "/"
	repeat with fn in fileList
		set psxFn to quoted form of POSIX path of fn
		set hideThisFile to ((text items 1 thru -2 of psxFn) as text) & "/." & last text item of psxFn
		do shell script "mv " & psxFn & " " & hideThisFile
	end repeat
	set AppleScript's text item delimiters to tid
end open

Copy/Paste into an AppleScript Editor window, and save as an application.

This will convert all the invisible files in a folder to visible, leaving out ".DS_Store" and ".localized" files:

set theFolder to choose folder

set thePsxFolder to POSIX path of theFolder

set allTheFiles to (do shell script "ls -A " & (quoted form of thePsxFolder))

set numFiles to number of paragraphs of allTheFiles

repeat with x from 1 to numFiles
	set fileName to paragraph x of allTheFiles
	
	if character 1 of fileName is "." then
		
		if (fileName is not ".DS_Store") and (fileName is not ".localized") then
			set charArray to characters of fileName
			set newFileName to thePsxFolder & (characters 2 thru -1 of fileName) as text
			
			set oldFileName to thePsxFolder & fileName
			
			do shell script "mv " & (quoted form of oldFileName) & " " & (quoted form of newFileName)
			
		end if
	end if
end repeat

This can be saved as a script or app or whatever.

mt