Imagine this: you have a video file on the desktop that you’d like to move to your video folder on D:\; you drag and drop it over an icon hovering on your desktop and *poof* , the file is moved. You then would like to extract a zip archive from your download folder onto your desktop; so you open that folder, drag the zip file onto the same hovering icon and *poof* it appears, unzipped, on your desktop.
This is the kind of flexibility that DropIt (“a little hovering icon on your desktop”) can provide, and it can do this based on rules that the user defines him or herself. For example, you can tell DropIt “if the file contains the word “projectA” in it, then move it to “D:\ProjectA\”; if the file is a JPG, PNG, GIF, or BMP then move it to “My Pictures”, and so on.
But what’s more, DropIt allows for the creation of multiple “profiles”, that you can switch across via right clicking on the icon. For example, you can have a “from desktop” and a “to desktop” profiles, with a different set of programmed outcomes generated by the same trigger event.
What’s remarkable about this software is the sense of possibility; a few rules and a handful of possible actions can amount to a great many potential uses. There are 6 possible actions in fact, at least as of this writing: move, copy, compress, extract, open with, delete, and exclude.
PROS: what I like about this program
Prompts user on duplicate patterns: you can define the same pattern more than once with different actions for each (e.g. “.ZIP move to D:\Downloads, “.ZIP extract on the desktop“; the program will prompt the user for which action to use on a case by case basis (see screenshot to the right).- Handles both files and folders: the latter being denoted by two asterisks (e.g. projectA* =all files that start with “projectA”; projectA** = all folders that start with that string).
- Can be added to the send-to menu: if you would rather right click on your items than drop them on a hovering icon.
- Can create multiple profiles: for example you can have a profile for each project you are working on, etc. Each profile can have its own distinct icon. Multiple profiles show up as multiple entries in the send to context menu.
- Icon: can be customized, always on top, and locked into place. If necessary.
- Portable version: available.
CONS: or, more accurately, my WISH LIST
- The ability to specify AND in conditions list; i.e. that a file is both a PNG and has “project A” in its name BOTH. Currently all conditions are “or” conditions. This means that currently you cannot specify JPGs that have “ProjectA” in their name go to “D:\projectA\images\” and JPGs that have “ProjectB” go to “D:\projectA\images\”. A pity.
- The ability to sort or rank conditions.:i.e. give priority to this rule, and then if it doesn’t apply apply the next one, etc.
- The ability to specify “is not true” in conditions.: would be great if the first wish list item were implemented.
The verdict: this is the kind of awesome app that creates many possibilities and lets the user run with it. I give it my highest accolade and it should have been included in my recent post on notable Windows enhancements, but I only found it after the fact.
The program can be much improved (see wish list above) but as it is it is excellent. Check it out.
Version Tested: 2.5
Compatibility: Windows XP, Vista, Windows 7.
Go to the program home page to download the latest version (approx 1.94 megs).
wow….very nice tip on this app. i agree with its usefulness!
Hi, I’m one of the two authors of DropIt.. I desire to report you that we are working on next release and any feature request is welcome to improve the software.
About your requests:
1. combinations of rules are supported, you can for example use “project a*.png” and “project b*.png” to sort them in two different folders (and you can also create patterns with more rules together, like “*.jpg;*.png;*.gif” to sort these 3 formats in the same destination).
2. it was a feature request of some versions ago, but we finally excluded it because a file/folder can match or not with a pattern, if not the pattern is ignored and if yes it is listed in the window to select the action.. so our doubt is how it may be used (you could report us your idea).
3. sorry, I cannot understand the meaning of ability to specify “is not true” in conditions, but as I said any request is welcome and you could mail us this and other ideas if you want).
i’ve always thought belvedere could do better
Just FYI:
Possible alternatives from one of your fav freeware sites (DonationCoder.com)
Dropzone
Simple drag-n-drop windows to quickly copy or move files.
http://skwire.dcmembers.com/wb/pages/software/drop-zone.php
File-Punter
Use regular expressions to copy/move files into dynamically generated destination folders.
http://skwire.dcmembers.com/wb/pages/software/file-punter.php
More software by Skwire:
http://skwire.dcmembers.com/wb/pages/software.php
Cheers
@ Lupo: thanks for writing (and for a great program)
Here’s what I wanted to do that I cannot figure out. Note that I have relocated the desktop to D:\Desktop\
I want to drag a zip file located on the desktop to DropIt and have it moved somewhere, say D:\Downloads
However, if I drag a zip file located anywhere else to DropIt I want it extracted on the desktop.
I was hoping the following patterns would do this
- pattern1: D:\desktop\*.zip -> move to D:\download
- pattern 2: *.zip -> extract to D:\desktop
The first pattern did not seem to work
So I thought I would use the semicolon as follows
- pattern 1: D:\desktop\*;*.zip -> move to D:\download
- pattern 2: *.zip -> extract to D:\desktop
It didn’t work; it crashed the app
Then I tried
- pattern 1: “d:\desktop\”*;*.zip (i.e. I added quotes) -> move to D:\download
- pattern 2: *.zip -> extract to D:\desktop
This time DropIt didn’t crash, but it didn’t work quite as intended. DropIt asked me which one of the two I wanted to execute.
Hence my wish list. I wanted to be able to tell it:
(1) If BOTH the file is a zip file and it is on the desktop, then move it to D:\download
(2) however, if the file is a zip and it is NOT TRUE that it is on the desktop, then extract it to desktop.
Is this possible right now with DropIt? I would be very curious to know. Thanks!
Currently it is not possible, you are right..
I’m considering to add it, in particular the first solution you proposed. It may be simple, the only “limitation” is that files dropped from Desktop will match with both patterns and you will need to select how to proceed (because they correctly match also with *.zip)..
I think you will love next major releases.. we are working on several new features like Rename action, scheduled folder scanning (like Belvedere), extra filters (base on file size and date), multiple actions and much more!
Your feature request is now implemented in beta version 3.0 available from here:
http://www.portablefreeware.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=5441&hilit=dropit&start=465
If you want to test this release under development, it currently includes several good improvements: scheduled folder scanning, full paths as patterns, improved Edit Association window, new Rename action, improved Delete action, more internal environment variables…