prelaps · VFilemanage

A folder can hold a file in only one place. A file that is a "contract", from "2024" and for "Client A" can only live in one of those folders, and the other two will not find it. That is when people look for tags. macOS Finder has colour tags; what about Windows?

Tagging a file in Windows

• Right-click the file and open Properties.
• On the Details tab, find Tags and type a word. Separate several with semicolons.
• Search File Explorer with tags:contract to find files with that tag.

The tag is written into the file's own metadata, so it travels with the file when you move it.

Many files have no Tags field

The catch: the Tags field only appears if the file format has room to store it. JPEG photos and Office documents such as Word and Excel files have it; PNG, PDF and TXT, among many others, have no Tags field on the Details tab at all.

In practice you end up with "photos yes, screenshots no; documents yes, PDFs no". When half the files you meant to tag cannot be tagged, searching by tag never becomes a habit.

Grouping regardless of format

What tags really do is put one file in several groups. If that is remembered outside the file instead of written into it, format no longer matters.

That is how VFilemanage works. Instead of tags it uses virtual folders, and the same file can sit in several of them at once.

• Put the same PDF in "Contracts", "2024" and "Client A" and it shows up in all three.
• There is one original, and it is not moved. No extra disk space is used.
• PNG, PDF, video — any format, because the file itself is never modified.

The trade-off: these groups exist only inside VFilemanage. Send the file to another PC and they do not travel with it. For a classification that must move with the file, use Windows tags (where the format allows) or put it in the file name.

For shortcuts, libraries and symbolic links, see how to organize files without moving them.

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