Leopard to feature a totally redesigned Finder, based on Spotlight

[Leen Toelen <toelen gmail com>]

It never hurts to know what the 'competition' is doing.

From: http://www.macosxrumors.com/articles/2005/10/20/exclusive-leopard-to-feature-a-totally-redesigned-finder-based-on-spotlight/

Leopard to feature a totally redesigned Finder, based on Spotlight

To date, the only information Apple has provided about Mac OS X 10.5
Leopard is that it will come sometime between late 2006 and 2007 and
that it will be Intel compatible. Meanwhile, anonymous sources
revealed to MacosXrumors the first major feature of Leopard and it
looks like it has to do with the Finder.

According to the sources, Apple will entirely re-design the Finder in
its next major Mac OS X update. The new version of the Finder,
code-named "Chardonnay" (like the wine), will be totally based on the
Spotlight meta-search technology which was introduced earlier this
year with Tiger.

The extensive use of Spotlight in the next version of Finder will
bring the following enhancements to it:
- significant overall performance increase
- improved user interface
- even more integrated Spotlight related features (search, smart
folders, document previews…).

The aim behind this new Finder is to offer to the user the ability to
browse his files just as he browses his music. Users will be able to
browse files by different criterias (name, type/creator, creation
date, modification date…).

Sources also told that Apple may also add the ability to edit
meta-tags directly from the Finder, just as we edit ID3Tags on iTunes.
Though this feature doesn't appear to be implemented in early builds,
the new Finder's architecture is making it quite easy to add such a
feature, explain sources.

On the developers side, Apple should also improve Spotlight's API a
lot, making it easier to use for developers and more powerful. It
should be possible for developers of Cocoa applications to add
meta-tags support to a document type with few coding.

This first drop of information already shows that Leopard will be far
more than a cosmetic update. We guess Apple has many other major
features in development for this reelase. We'll be trying to get more
details on this major feature as well as on other Leopard features so
don't hesitate to contact us if you know more about Leopard.