The Magic Folder - a very cool gadget for the Windows Vista sidebar
I'm quite happy to use Vista's default folders when saving documents, movies and images and depend on the use of tags, instead of subfolders, to sort and find my files. My PC desktops are always very messy, with all sorts of files, screenshots, snippets and sundry documents saved there for easy access. But, moving the files to the default storage folders once they are no longer needed on the desktop has always been a bit of a pain.
I found a new gadget tonight that promises to become an essential tool on all of my computers. The author describes The Magic Folder as follows:
"The Magic Folder is a gadget that helps you categorize and move files. When you drag a file to the gadget it will look at the file extension and place Document files (like doc, xls, ppt, etc) in the Document folder. It places image files like (JPEG, PNG, TIFF, GIF, etc) into the Pictures folder. And many more extension types come pre-registered."
Its a brilliant idea that works well once you break yourself of the "I must save my files to sub-folders" habit and get used to using tags and Vista's new way of searching.
So far the gadget has worked like a dream. Files are automatically saved to the appropriate folder (customisable) and any file type extensions that are not recognised are easily taken care of. Simply choose a folder.
So far the only bug I have found is that the Gadget itself cannot be dragged to a different position on the Sidebar. Instead, all of the other Gadgets have to be manoeuvered until the Magic Folder icon is where you want it.
Various screenshots of The Magic Folder are below. It's well worth a try.
