Thumbnails in zip files

[shravan2x]

What feature or improvement do you think would benefit Files?

Thumbnails currently don't show when viewing compressed files. Could there be an option to enable this?

Requirements

• Add option to display thumbnails for media in compressed files, for perf reasons since not everyone would want it.
• When opening a compressed file, generate thumbnails for media if the option is set.

Files Version

2.5.21.0

Windows Version

22621.1992

Comments

No response

[yaira2]

@shravan2x thank you for your feedback, thumbnails aren't available for compressed files by design. You can however extract the archives to view them.

[shravan2x]

@yaira2 Can you clarify why we want this behavior by design? It seems like it would be a useful feature.

[shravan2x]

@yaira2 Bump, could you clarify the above?

[yaira2]

I'm not sure the reasoning behind this but it's consistent with the behavior in File Explorer as well.

[Josh65-2201]

It isn't possible when compressed as Files (Windows File Explorer too) would have to decompress the archive to get the correct data for that file and then generate the thumbnail. It wouldn't make sense to auto extract archive as you browsed through it.

[shravan2x]

I agree that it's consistent with the behavior in File Explorer. But File Explorer is an outdated tool. That's what makes Files.app so amazing - it feels like it's built for 2023!

Yeah, you'd have to decompress the archive to get the correct data for each file. But if done with virtualization in mind, you'd only have to decompress the images and videos that are visible in the current frame. On modern systems, this is usually an acceptably expensive operation, especially keeping in mind that user convenience would take priority. If the alternative is to open each media file manually to see what it was, that's significantly more inconvenience for the user than a few seconds of CPU time.

I've also personally built a similar feature - the performance hit isn't much on a modern multi-core machine. That said, it could certainly be opt-in.

[GPBeta]

I'm looking for a modern file explorer to preview images in zips too.
It's disappointing that Files refuse doing it, so my workaround is using something like WinMount to mount the zip file and preview images inside with the old school file explorer or Files.app,

[jmonachesi]

I'm not sure the reasoning behind this but it's consistent with the behavior in File Explorer as well.

I just want to point out that the only reason I'm looking for a replacement for Windows Explorer is that exact same feature. I don't think missing features are things to be considered as consistent behavior but in any case it's your software.