salamanders' labDocumentation

Understanding the UI

When you open the application, you will get something resembling the following:

Let's present what each element of the window represents:

• dir: (top left) corresponds to the path to your current folder

• [6] (top right) corresponds to the number of element in your folder

• elements in green correspond to folders

• elements in white correspond to files

• elements on the right of each line respectively correspond to the size and last modification date

• NAV corresponds to the current mode of the application, on its right you can find the status message bar

• ~> Corresponds to the text bar which is mostly used in the SEA mode and when SCFE needs some input from you (e.g: renaming a file)

REMARK: If you ever wonder if you have files selected/copied or other, just quickly glance at the status message. It will give you a good idea of the status of the application.

Introduction to navigation modes

The SCFE application provides you with two main navigation modes. Those are NAV and SEA respectively NAVigation and SEArch. To switch from one to the other, you have depending on your current mode 1 or 2 alternatives which are:

e	If you are currently in NAV mode and want to switch to SEA mode
Ctrl + e	If you want to switch from either mode to the other

The main difference between both search modes is that: (newbie | simplified)

• in NAV mode the keys of your keyboards are shortcuts that allow you to navigate through files extremely efficiently

• in SEA mode you have to maintain the Ctrl alongside the NAV mode shortcut in order to use a shortcut. The reason for this difference is the fact that you can type in names of files and folders in the SEA mode which you cannot do in NAV mode. (to learn more, see Bascis III | I AM A BOSS (SEA mode | Like a boss))

Remark: you can use the Ctrl key as well in NAV mode

Remark: for advanced users, See Bascis III | I AM A BOSS

Navigating your files

Although there are different ways of navigating your files in SCFE, we will here discuss the simplest and most instinctive one. The one you need to know to get going. The basic keys you need to remember are henceforth:

← The Back Arrow	key corresponds to a go to the parent directory
↓ The Down Arrow	key corresponds to move the cursor down
↑ The Up Arrow	key corresponds to move the cursor up
→ The Right Arrow	key corresponds to the go-to children directory/enter key

REMARK: If you use the right arrow key on a file, this will open the file in question just as the return key would

Remark: As indicated previously, for advanced users, more powerful navigation technics can be found in the Bascis III | I AM A BOSS

Doing things with files

If you ever find yourself wondering how to perform a basic operation, think OOOOOOption. Why? Because when you type o (in NAV mode or Ctrl + o in SEA mode), it launches a "File Option" page. From this page, you will not only be able to complete the focused action by hitting the ENTER key but the application will also remind you of the essential shortcuts for day-to-day actions. To get rid of the "File Option", just press the ESC key or go to the button labeled "back" and press ENTER

Another very important shortcut to remember is Shift + o which will open the "Current Directory Options". This enables you to perform daily actions on your current folder (such as refresh, create a new folder...)

When SCFE needs input from you

You now recognize the typical SCFE window. Here we redirect your attention towards the bottom of the window. In the Text box area.

Here, you can see someone, here an SCFE member, create a new file from the application. Where we want to draw your attention though, is to what you have to do when the application requires your input. When this happens, the application will, on its own, focus on the text box. If you have a doubt concerning what you have to do, remember to have a glance at the status message, it will tell you what to do. In this case, the user has to give a new name to the file he is creating.

All the shortcuts seen in this part are prety much straight forward as you will see as you discover them.

Remark: If you want to cancel any action on files/folders, just press the ESC key once.

Creating

n	to create a new file
shift + n	to create a new folder

Editing

c	to copy a file/folder
x	to cut a file/folder
v	to paste a file/folder
r	to rename a file/folderr

Multiple file selection

SPACE	bar to select files/folders
s	to select files/folders

selecting multiple files will look something like this (Here two files are selected, the ones in blue):

Remark: Selecting multiple files in SCFE is very powerful as you can operate actions on all of those at the same time (e.g: deleting multiple files, etc.).

Remark: It is nice to note that most of the previous and following shortcuts will work conjointly with selecting multiple files. Although, some actions like renaming are not compatible with multiple file selection at the moment

Deleting

Please note that deleting a file/folder requires confirmation. Therefore you will need to procede as follows to delete in SCFE:

DELETE

key to delete a file/folder

remark: Please be mindful that deleting a file in SCFE is permanant and therefore cannot be undone. There are not trash/trash-can of any sort.

Remark: Please note that on macs the DELETE key is optained by pressing Fn + SUPR

This section of the documentation is for those of you who already master the Basics I__ part of the documentation and want to get more out of their daily use of SCFE. You will learn here, how to show hidden files, navigate through your files extremely fast and finally how to Change the sorting order in the app.

Showing hidden files

t	to toggle hidden files/folders

Remark: Hidden files are shown in gray and hidden folders in orange. This way is is easier to differentiate them from traditional files/folders

Go-to

g	To use go-to

This functionality is very powerful! And as you are probably already an advanced user, you must know your folders by heart from the hundreds of hours you spent looking for files on your machine. If so SCFE might just have become dear to your heart. Indeed, the Go-to functionnality allows you to go to any directory in your machine using an absolut path.

Change Sorting method

Shift + S Change Sorting order

SCFE as quite a lot of different sorting methods to suit your needs and preferences. Unfortunately, for now we do not save those preferences from one session to the other. The different Sorting methods are:

A → Z	sorting by name
.A → .Z	sorting by extension
big → small	sorting by size
recents → old	sorting by date

Toggle sorting order

Shift + Q

Toggle Sorting order

The toggle sorting order functionality allows you to just switch the order in which you display the files depending on your sorting method. For example if you sort from A → Z toggling it will end up by showing the files from Z → A.

COMING SOON

This section of the documentation will mainly set its focus on how to use git in SCFE. This tool being very powerful, we think it deserves a substential place in the documentation.

Using Git in SCFE

Remark: We would like to draw your attention to the fact that, the color scheme changes for git repositories. Indeed, you can see that a not-modified file will be displayed in white where as the not-modified folders will be displayed in blue. Modified files/folders will be displayed in brown. Futhermore ignored files/folders will be displayed in gray.

NB: For privacy and security reasons, we do not show nor save any passwords you may enter in the app (this is why you will have to re-enter your password everytime).

Git 1 0 1 : Getting Started

Alt + i	Initialize a repository in the current directory
Shift + G	Clone a repository in the current directory

Remark: Cloning/Initializing a repository will put you in the directory cloned/created

Git 2 0 2 : Manipulating Files

Shift + P	Pull from origin
i	Stage file if possible
Shift + C	Create a commit
p	push to origin
Shift + I	Unstage file if possible

NAV mode : Like a boss

Similar to Vim's shortcuts for power navigation, you can use the h, j, k, l keys to navigate through files in a similar manner to the one you would with the arrow keys. Considering:

h	as ←
j	as ↓
k	as ↑
l	as →

REMARK: Those shortcuts are very powerful as you can notice that the h, j, k, l keys of your keyboard are on the same line making the access to any of those key shockingly easy. The goal is to put your four fingers each resting on one key and ready to enter in action as soon as needed.

Remark: if you don't remember what the arrow keys do, see introduction to navigating your files.

COM mode

Ctrl + Enter	To swicth to COM mode
Shift + M	To swicth to COM mode on Macs

COM mode is very powerful. You can use SCFE as your normal terminal (or nearly). You can in fact not navigate through your files with the cd command because it would have been redondant with the go-to functionality and would have not worked as well. Although all the other commands you are used to use will work just as expected in the app.

COMING SOON