In Emacs’ Dired, You could conveniently move files from outside into Emacs by simply dragging them there.

Drag files in dired

That is effective.

Emacs has been my faithful companion for over 5 years, and I just stumbled upon this remarkable feature minutes ago.

Typically, I rely on async-shell-commands to open the current buffer directory in Windows 10’s File Manager, then move files from folder to folder.

But, now, this seeming-trival discovery has greatly enhanced my workflow, instill in me a strong sence that Emacs not only coexists within the operating system, but rather embodies the operating system itself.

While it is true that Windows does not support dragging files to external locations, I seldom encounter such a requirement in my day-to-day workflows.

Have you ever had such an experience? Discovered an amazing feature after a long time using Emacs?

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  • ZwzhhhBEnglish
    1·
    1 year ago

    Set `dired-mouse-drag-files` to t, and you can also drag file from dired to other programs!

    • ThaodanBEnglish
      1·
      1 year ago

      Doesn’t seem to work with PGTK for me.

    • AbstProcDoOPBEnglish
      1·
      1 year ago

      Yes, it not support Windows temporarily:

      This feature is supported only on X Windows, Haiku, and Nextstep (macOS or GNUstep

      That does not matter at all, I rarely have such a requirement to move file out from emacs, since it could easily move around within Emacs.

      • github-alphapapaBEnglish
        1·
        1 year ago

        This feature is supported only on X Windows

        Friendly correction: It’s called the X Window System, X11, or simply X (Xorg now being the standard implementation of it). I tell you this only because if you call it “X Windows” it sounds like you don’t know better. :)

  • jsledBEnglish
    1·
    1 year ago

    instill in me a strong sence that Emacs not only coexists within the operating system, but rather embodies the operating system itself.

    It just implements being a drag-and-drop target; it does not “coexist within the operating system”

    While it is true that Windows does not support dragging files from dired buffer to external locations, but I seldom encounter such a requirement in my day-to-day workflows.

    Windows folders support being a drop-target; this is likely emacs not supporting /its/ side of the protocol.

    Ah, I see the dired-mouse-drag-files note, below.