Feature Request: Add power user mode with enhanced features

[spotlesscoder]

Problem

I want to binary diff two files in the download section to verify that the downloaded file equals binary the original file I uploaded before

Proposal

I want a per-user setting in elementary OS files that each user can enable optionally via gsettings. That should be called "power user mode" or something like that.

When enabled, I want the default right click menu in the main viewport to have an additional sub-menu with additional features. One feature that would be very useful is triggering a byte-level comparison of two currently selected files.

When power save mode is on (introduced with eOS 7 IIRC), a warning should be displayed for files over (200M?) as reading and comparing large files will likely drain the battery a lot.

(optionally: if more than 2 files are selected, display a table with each filename as both rows and columns and mark the cells of matching pairs with "x". To save compute power, compare the files sequentially - if A matches B and also C, we don't need to compare A and B as well as B and C and A and C - we only need to compare A and B and B and C - then we know that A and C must also be same)

Prior Art (Optional)

No response

[jeremypw]

I cannot see the suggested dual-mode UX being approved tbh bearing in mind that dual-mode click handling was discontinued. A possible alternative would be to provide contracts for advanced functions which could be optionally installed. An example of such a function can be found here https://github.com/jeremypw/gpg_wrapper and there may be others in other repos. Not sure how these would be distributed though as they cannot be flatpaked.

[jeremypw]

As you are probably aware you can do a byte comparison with cmp -b FILE1 FILE2 in the terminal. You can copy & paste the selected files from Files into a terminal after the command although you have to manually replace the newline between the pasted files with a space which is annoying.

[jeremypw]

Another option is a set of optional plugins like Code but unless and until an AppMenu for Files is approved that won't work as it needs UX to select which plugins you want.

[spotlesscoder]

Thx :) Do you know whether cmp supports 2+ files with the optimization I thought of (or even better optimization?)

[spotlesscoder]

the code app might not be the most appealing solution for people without programming experience and might scare them a bit away from using the feature

[jeremypw]

man cmp indicates that cmp is limited to comparing 2 files, although there are a number of other options.

There is the command diff3 that compares 3 files but that is intended for text files only. Type man diff3 into terminal for further info.

[jeremypw]

I am only looking at built in commands available oob. No doubt there are others that could be installed.

[jeremypw]

Probably best to create separate issues for each feature you feel Files is lacking and which could be useful to a significant number of users. There is no agreed definition of a "power user" unfortunately. Users comfortable using a terminal they can probably get what they want done anyway.