File manager

Conflicting file names in a target directory may be handled through renaming, overwriting, or skipping.

Some file managers provide network connectivity via protocols, such as FTP, HTTP, NFS, SMB or WebDAV.

A term that predates[citation needed] the usage of file manager is directory editor.

An early directory editor, DIRED, was developed circa 1974 at the Stanford Artificial Intelligence Laboratory by Stan Kugell.

The term was used by other developers, including Jay Lepreau, who wrote the dired program in 1980,[7] which ran on BSD.

Developers create applications that duplicate and extend the manager that was introduced by PathMinder and John Socha's Norton Commander for DOS.

Despite the age of this concept, file managers based on Norton Commander are actively developed, and dozens of implementations exist for DOS, Unix, and Microsoft Windows.

Nikolai Bezroukov publishes his own set of criteria for an OFM standard (version 1.2 dated June 1997).

The passive (inactive) panel shows the content of the same or another directory (the default target for file operations).

Other common features include: The introduction of tabbed panels in some file managers (for example Total Commander) made it possible to manipulate more than one active and passive directory at a time.

This is unusual among command line managers in that something purporting to be a standard for the interface is published.

Sometimes they are called dual-pane managers, a term that is typically used for programs such as the Windows File Explorer (see below).

Since the advent of GUIs, it has become the dominant type of file manager for desktop computers.

For macOS, the Miller columns view in Finder (originating in NeXTStep) is a variation on the navigational file manager theme.

However, expanding (+) or collapsing (-) a portion of the tree without selecting a directory will not alter the contents of the right pane.

Three-dimensional file browsing has not become popular; the exact implementation tends to differ between projects, and there are no common standards to follow.

More advanced, and usually commercially distributed, web-based file management scripts allow the administrator of the file manager to configure secure, individual user accounts, each with individual account permissions.

For example, documents, digital media, publishing layouts, and presentations can be stored, managed, and shared between customers, suppliers, and remote workers, or just internally.