Why does Sort by in Finder always revert to Date Last Opened?

[mcsolas]

I would like to set as default for all folders in my documents to display with
Arrange by: Kind
Sort by: Name

However, somehow it always seems like Sort by reverts to Date Last Opened. I switch it over all the time and it seems every restart I have to do it again.

Is there any way to force Finder to remember this setting and apply it as a global default?

 

[r0k]

I would like to set as default for all folders in my documents to display with
Arrange by: Kind
Sort by: Name

However, somehow it always seems like Sort by reverts to Date Last Opened. I switch it over all the time and it seems every restart I have to do it again.

Is there any way to force Finder to remember this setting and apply it as a global default?

Wow. I never noticed this. I keep mine set to sort by date as I find this to be most useful. There are a handful of folders that insist on opening sorted by name instead of date. These are mostly folders I don't actually own like /Users/Shared or network folders for NAS drives where I'm logged in as guest.

I suggest you spend a little time in finder preferences and see if there is an option to make all folders sort by name. I think this is what I did to get everything sorted by date but it's been working flawlessly for so long, I forgot how I did it.

 

[mcsolas]

I suggest you spend a little time in finder preferences and see if there is an option to make all folders sort by name. I think this is what I did to get everything sorted by date but it's been working flawlessly for so long, I forgot how I did it.

I took a look, didn't see anything. Its seems to inheriting it from somewhere and overriding how I want to display the files. If I could only figure out where. In the older OS I used to use, there was a button "apply these display settings to all folders" or something like that and you can set it that way. would be cool if that was an option.

 

[Gregg2]

However, somehow it always seems like Sort by reverts to Date Last Opened. I switch it over all the time and it seems every restart I have to do it again.

How are you sorting? Right click on the window? If so, that's designed as a temporary rearrangement only.

Is there any way to force Finder to remember this setting and apply it as a global default?

Yes, but since you may have tweaked some windows already, they will not change. Use Show View Options (Command-J) at the highest level folder you want to apply the settings to. Get everything just right, then check the Use As Defaults box. Now repeat the settings in any folders you come across that had been set to something else already (using SVO). Done.

 

[mcsolas]

How are you sorting? Right click on the window? If so, that's designed as a temporary rearrangement only.

Yes, right click on window.

Yes, but since you may have tweaked some windows already, they will not change. Use Show View Options (Command-J) at the highest level folder you want to apply the settings to. Get everything just right, then check the Use As Defaults box. Now repeat the settings in any folders you come across that had been set to something else already (using SVO). Done.

I am trying it using CMD-J as suggested. I had trouble finding the "Use as Defaults" button until I switched to view > As List. I was then able to I set it to my preferred settings. Hopefully that will help.

Thank you very much for the assistance here, this was driving me crazy. I modify the finder views a lot. At least I can know how to reset this when needed.