Newbie's headache - create a link to open a folder?

[Dave_Essel]

In the process of getting to grips with DTpro (1.3beta3), I have a workflow that would be nicely controlled from DTpro that requires a link in DTpro to open a folder on my Mac.

And I can’t make this happen for love nor money!

DTpro’s help says to do the following

Launch: Launch URL / Launch Path: Tries to open the file, folder, or Internet location indicated by the URL or Path field in the Info Panel. You can use these commands to open the original files the document was created from. You can also visit the original of a webpage that you have downloaded using the Download Manager.

Another section of the extensive (but none too easy to navigate) help says:

CREATING A TEXT LINK TO AN EXTERNAL FILE

Linking a text passage to an external file is only possible by using a workaround at the moment.

To create a link to an external file, do the following:

(1) Use “File > Link To” to choose the desired external file and create a new link document in DEVONthink Professional.
(2) Select that new link document, select “Tools > Show Info” and copy the Path information to the clipboard.
(3) Paste the Path URL information into your rich text document, like this: “file://localhost/Volumes/Star3/WBD%20Notes%20050505/A%20History%20of%20the%20GUI.rtfd/” (Note: this link won’t work as it points to a file on our hard drive)
(4) Use either “Format > Make Link” or the contextual menu “Make Link” to convert the URL to a clickable link.
(4) Select the URL text and change it to whatever you like to make it more readable.

(above from tutorial database).

There is NO “File > Link to” in the File Menu.

And yet the concept works. A workaround of ridiculous complexity consists of using ‘competing’ product Mori to create the link!!! The "Make Link to… " function works with perfect ease in Mori, like so:

Just highlight a word a say Make Link to [any file or folder]

This creates a link in the same format as is referred to in the DTpro tutorial database:

as may be seen from the above screenshot.

But amazingly, copy the words containing the link in Mori and paste to an rtf in DTpro and the link works perfectly:

as this screenshot for DTpro shows.

I’m probably missing something. So my question is: can any of you clever people tell me how to do this properly without leaving DTpro??!?!?!?

[milhouse]

If you want to create a link to an external folder, create a new rtf document in DTP.

I use PathFinder so copying the url file path is easy.

I copy the path of the target file, paste it into the new rtf document. I highlight it and choose “make link” from the CM.

Clicking on the link, opens the target file in the Finder.

[Dave_Essel]

Thanks for a workaround that works!

For me it will mean having to startup PathFinder specially (or going back to using it). I stopped a few months ago as it was p*ssing me off by crashing every so often and also I like some folder windows to list by date and some alphabetically - if you change a list view in one Pathfinder window, all the others change as well, so I was constantly having to change my list views.

But I’ll use that solution for now in the hope that something elegant is forthcoming. (The elegant way is how it’s done in Mori: two clicks and the word of your choice is linked to open a file/folder).

[milhouse]

You can also try the free CM plugin for the Finder filepathCM.

I have yet to try it myself but it looks neat.

[Bill_DeVille]

Still another workaround is to Command-Option-Drag a file from the Finder to the insertion point in your rich text document in DT Pro. That will create a clickable link to the external file.

Note: Once you’ve inserted that link, you can select it and change the text string to whatever you wish. The link will still work. Tip: add an extra space after the insertion place first, so that when you hit Return all remaining text won’t become part of the link.

[Dave_Essel]

Command-Option drag is nice

I’ll go with that – and so off to work.

Thank you very much everyone

[alexwein]

@Bill_DeVille

Tip: add an extra space after the insertion place first, so that when you hit Return all remaining text won’t become part of the link.

Good tip, Bill. I learned this a while back…the hard way!

[Bill_DeVille]

Hi, Alexandria. How do you think I learned it?

Actually, that’s the way to avoid similar problems in most word processors.

[milhouse]

Interesting that you posted this. I was wondering how to avoid it as well.

thanks