Open vs Explore Problem in Vista

I was shown this interesting problem by a friend whom I was trying to help, and got stuck myself with the same problem... Let me explain: We are all familliar with "Explore" and the Tree structure on the left side, vs "Open", which opens a folder in a single window. Normally, in Explore, as you click on the folders you travel thru the tree and can pretty quickly navigate thru the system, whereas with Open, you can get there, but it isn't quite as easy if you take a wrong turn to back out & recover. Explore is a good name for that option, as that's what it's best for... It also means you don't have to have two windows open to move files, as you can drag to any folder in the nav pane with relative ease... With Open you're better off with multiple open windows for those file relocation tricks...

Well... I found the the Organize/Layout/Navigation pane in Vista, and turned it off, as he wanted Open to be a single window. That "sort of" fixed it, but we discovered that now, if you right click and select to "explore" a folder, although it does open the explorer window with the navigation pane on the left, as soon as you attempt to navigate by selecting a folder in the left pane, it will immediately switch to an "Open" window, and you lose the navigation pane and "explore" has just left the building. Very interesting.... Things that make you go "huh?". Even better: If you turn on the navigation pane (pretty obvious, eh?) you get it, but when you select "Open" for a folder, it opens it up in an explore window, and you never see the single "Open" window again. "Open" becomes "explore" & you lose the choice altogether...

I have tried the registry change to change the default folder clicking behaviour, but it seems the Navigation pane setting overrides all, and there is (almost) no difference between "Open" and "Explore" anymore. If you turn on the pane you never get a single "Open" window, regardless of which you select, and if you turn it off and select "Explore", you start out with an Explore window that dumps for a single pane "Open" window as soon as you try to navigate anywhere...

What has happenned here? Can I recover the choice to Open or Explore as it used to work? I have spend some time and find nothing that describes what I'm observing, yet I've seen it happening on several PC's now...

Hello SuperBat, and welcome to Vista Forums.

You might see if this may help.

http://www.vistax64.com/tutorials/91587-open-folder-same-separate-new-window.html

Hope this helps,
Shawn

Hi: Thanks for the reply. Here's what what happens, repeatedly, for every folder you open. Basically: There are two conditions that apply:

1 - With the Navigation Pane turned off, If I open a folder with "explore", it starts with the "Explore" window with it's navigation tree on the left, but changes to the single window as soon as you start to "explore" by selecting a sub-folder from the tree. The Nav pane dissapears!, and you can't "explore".

2 - With the setting for the nav pane turned on, you can select "Explore" or "Open", and you get only the "Explore" window with it's navigation pane. There is now no difference for the "Open" choice!

There is supposed to be (there used to be...) a differrence between Explore & Open. Looks like making the original change destroys the difference.

By the way... I'm still reading & checking the link you sent. Hoping for something new... Did Vista change it from the way it used to be? Seems like that too... I only ran into this after SP2...

Thanks!

SuperBat,

Did you see if step 3 in OPTION TWO at the tutorial link above helped with the Navigation Pane turned on?

Brink said:

SuperBat,

Did you see if step 3 in OPTION TWO at the tutorial link above helped with the Navigation Pane turned on?

Click to expand...

No change by returning to default. (The default is the same window... It doesn't change windows, it just closes the nav pane. Odd!) it's either open or explore but both depend on the layout settings. With nav pane on, everything is explore (including Open), and with Nav pane off, explore starts, but changes to open... Basically this setting rules all, and I can no longer do both. It's an odd one. Even the "My Computer" window, which opens Explorer with it's nav pane, drops out as soon as you select the C: drive.

I'm still scanning thru the options, most of which I had seen before, but so far, I'm still stuck with either Open for all or Explore for all, with that Layout setting overruling everything else.

Thanks, again. (Can you "Open" or "Explore" a folder and get the right windows???) I'm thinking maybe Microsoft changed it globally. It's not a Bug! It's a Feature! ;-)

As a test, create a new administrator account, and see how it works in it. If it works ok, then copy the contents of your old account's C:\Users\(user-name) folders into the new account's corresponding C:\Users\(user-name) folders. After everything checks out, then you can delete the old user account.

Brink said:

As a test, create a new administrator account, and see how it works in it. If it works ok, then copy the contents of your old account's C:\Users\(user-name) folders into the new account's corresponding C:\Users\(user-name) folders. After everything checks out, then you can delete the old user account.

Click to expand...

Great idea! One of my favorites, in fact. Usually this approach will solve the strange & quirky effects of any misguided Windows session. Back in my Corporate Win2k and XP-Pro days this was a standard appoach to any strange PC behaviour.

However... The results are the same. Opening a folder brings up the same window as Explore. Oh, there is one difference: Right clicking a folder & selecting "Open" brings up a new "explore" type window, where selecting "Explore" uses the current window. Which is exactly what it does under my other sign-ons, now that I have set the navigation pane on as my default. (Browsing is still easier with the nav pane, but I did like having a choice.)

I'll bet it's a Microsoft Vista feature that they think no one will notice . I know that most people never even notice the difference from my years of working in IS Admin and tech support. In order to remind myself of how it used to work I have to run one of my my computers with XP Pro. But I swear that Vista originally worked that way too. In fact I was demonstrating how "Open" differred from "Expore" when this whole thing began, and now we look at each other and ask if we could have imagined it, since both of our Vista PC's do the same thing (IE: Open = Explore).

I'm happy to hear that it sounds like you got it sorted then. Open=New and Explore=Current by default in Vista.

You may be happy to know that this setting has been improved in Windows 7.

Open each Folder in the Same or Own Separate New Window - Windows 7 Forums

SuperBat2009 said:

Brink said:

As a test, create a new administrator account, and see how it works in it. If it works ok, then copy the contents of your old account's C:\Users\(user-name) folders into the new account's corresponding C:\Users\(user-name) folders. After everything checks out, then you can delete the old user account.

Click to expand...

Great idea! One of my favorites, in fact. Usually this approach will solve the strange & quirky effects of any misguided Windows session. Back in my Corporate Win2k and XP-Pro days this was a standard appoach to any strange PC behaviour.

However... The results are the same. Opening a folder brings up the same window as Explore. Oh, there is one difference: Right clicking a folder & selecting "Open" brings up a new "explore" type window, where selecting "Explore" uses the current window. Which is exactly what it does under my other sign-ons, now that I have set the navigation pane on as my default. (Browsing is still easier with the nav pane, but I did like having a choice.)

I'll bet it's a Microsoft Vista feature that they think no one will notice . I know that most people never even notice the difference from my years of working in IS Admin and tech support. In order to remind myself of how it used to work I have to run one of my my computers with XP Pro. But I swear that Vista originally worked that way too. In fact I was demonstrating how "Open" differred from "Expore" when this whole thing began, and now we look at each other and ask if we could have imagined it, since both of our Vista PC's do the same thing (IE: Open = Explore).

Click to expand...