File Management

by typora.io

This document may get updated after more or better file management features being introduced in future.

Open Folder

You could select a folder in the open file dialog popup from File → Open menu to open a folder in Typora. Actually you do not need to open folder explicitly in this way, when you open a file, its parent folder will be automatically loaded, you could check the folder from “Files Sidebar”, which will be introduce below.

Files Sidebar

User can toggle sidebar from menubar or from titlebar on macOS and from status bar on Windows/Linux.

Typora has two types of sidebar:

toggle sidebar on macOS
Toggle Sidebar on macOS
toggle sidebar on macOS
Toggle Sidebar on Windows/Linux

In file tree mode, currently only folder and files that are supported by Typora (Markdown file, text file, etc) is displayed.

Actions in File Sidebar

Users could hover on side panel to show more buttons. On the bottom of left side bar, user can pop up menu items for current folder.

Other supported options can be found in context menu of specific file/folder. Supported actions includes:

Refresh File List / Tree

Typora will watch file changes in opened folder, and the file tree / list will be updated automatically when change happens, such as file being moved or deleted.

But in case the file tree / list does not updated correctly, you could perform a manual refresh by click “Refresh” item in the bottom menu of side bar.

Switch Folder

You could click “Open Folder…” item in the menu of file sidebar to open or switch current folder position.

Sort Files

User can sort files by alphabet, natural order1, modified date and creation date. Sort type can be changed from menu of file sidebar, action for each button is:

sort

  1. Enable / Disable Group by Folder.

    When enabled in file tree view, all folders will be displayed before files. When disabled in file tree view, folders and files are mixed and sorted.

    When enabled in file list view, articles will be grouped by their parent folder and sorted within same folder. When disabled in file list view, articles are sorted across different folders.

  2. Sort by natural order ascending / descending.

  3. Sort by alphabet order ascending / descending.

  4. Sort by modified date ascending / descending.

  5. Sort by created date ascending / descending.

Move File

File or folder can be moved by drag and drop in file tree panel.

You could also drag and drop between Finder/Explorer and Typora’s sidebar.

Also, drag file/folder from sidebar to writing area to would insert links towards dragged files.

Undo File Operation

You could undo last file operation such as move, rename or delete (only on macOS) file.

Please note that only last one file operation in Typora is undoable, on Windows/Linux, delete file is not undoable, and it may fail in some case (for example, file exists at target file when undo move file operation).

Remove Folder from Recent Locations

You can hover on folders under “Recent Locations” in files sidebar, and click “trash” icon to remove the folder from the list.

Screenshot 2023-07-04 at 16.40.25

Pin Folders

You can hover on folders under “Recent Locations” in files sidebar, and click “Pin” icon to pin the folder into the list. Pinned folder will also be included in File → Open Recent menubar and Open Quickly.

Screenshot 2023-07-04 at 16.42.22

You could use hyperlink syntax ( [label](src) ) to create links that links to other files/folder, the src part can be either absolute path or relative path, for example: [Readme](readme.md).

If target file does not exist, Typora will guide you to create the file automatically.

If you want to jump to target position of other files, you could append anchor after file target. For example, [Readme](readme.md#header-1) allows to jump to “header 1” position of readme.md. You can follow internal links about how to write an anchor.

Open Quickly

The quick open panel can be popped up by pressing Command+Shift+O (on macOS) or Ctrl+P (on Windows/Linux), or click “Open Quickly” from File menu.

You could use fuzzy search to find & open files in current folder quickly.

You could click the “Search” icon on side panel on macOS or just scroll top on side panel on Windows/Linux version of Typora to show global search input. Or use hotkey Command(Ctrl) + Shift + F to open global search.

Tags

Typora does not support #tags natively, but if you use #tags in your article, you could search “#tags” in global search to find all matched files.

Recent Files / Folders

Recent files / folders are recorded when you use Typora to open a file or folder. You can access recent files / folder from

If you do not want a folder to get flushed or removed automatically, you can pin this folder.

To clear recent files / folders, you can click File → Open Recent → Clear Items from menu bar to clear all history records. Please click “Clear Recent and Pinned Folders / Files” or select “Also clear pinned folders” if you want to clear recent files / folders and pinned folders.

Set Default Folder on Launch

As a file based Markdown editor, Typora does not have concepts like “default working folder”, but if you want Typora to load certain folder on launch, you could set a folder in Typora’s “launch options”.

Reopen Last File on Launch

For Windows / Linux version, you can set this in Preferences Panel → General → On Launch.

image

For macOS version, you can do following:

  1. Choose Apple menu > System Preferences, then click General. Open General preferences.
  2. Uncheck “Close windows when quitting an app.”

You can read more on Prevent apps and windows from reopening

JumpList (Windows)

Typora will put recent used folders/files on the jump list of Typora, you could pin frequently used file/folder and access them quickly from task bar.

Recent file and recent folder can be cleared by click “Open Recent” → “Clear Items” from File menu.

  1. We will sort by file name naturally, for example: 1-xxx, 2-xxx, 10-xxx instead of in alphabet order (1-xxx, 10-xxx, 2-xxx). ↩