How can I get an address bar in Finder?

Question

I'm used to knowing where all my files are. Is there a way to get an address bar to show up in Finder in OS X (10.5+) like in Explorer in Windows or Nautilus in GNOME?

I also want to be able to copy the address bar. Perhaps the workflow is different on a Mac, but I'm used to throughly sorting my files under many layers of folders and then when I need to upload or download something, or access a file in command line or etc, I can copy and paste that directly into the file dialog.

To clarify, my goal is to have an experience like in Windows: press CtrlD (CmdL) and CtrlC.

Answer 1

This feature is not available "as is" in Finder.app.

Instead, typing the path to a folder/file is done via cmdshiftg as pointed by @snk, displaying the path of your current location can be enabled with this one-liner in Terminal.app:

defaults write com.apple.finder _FXShowPosixPathInTitle -bool YES && killall Finder,

copying the path can be done with the contextual menu plugin mentioned by @ridogi.

Answer 2

The solution to your problem is FinderPath. Install it and then just double-click on the top of the window, where its name is shown. Or, you press CmdG. Voilà!

It is compatible with macOS Sierra.

Answer 3

It is simple. Just go to finder. Click on view. Select Show Path Bar or press the button alt + command + P.

See the image how you will enable Path Bar:

Once you have enables you can see Path bar at bottom of the window as the image below:

Answer 4

Regarding your edit: Just use the open command in Terminal.

open . will open your current working directory in Finder, open .. the parent directory, etc.

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In the other direction, you can use the proxy icon (the folder icon in the Finder title bar). Drag it into a Terminal window and the path to the folder will get inserted at the current cursor location.

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These approaches handle Terminal/Finder exchanges. With the ability to drag/drop files and folders onto open/save dialogs, the Go To Folder command in Finder, and the ability to navigate the folder hierarchy in Finder by Command-clicking the proxy icon, and the Go menu in Finder, there is little missing you might need for navigation. It's different from Windows, but works just as well.

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You can use Automator to create a Service that takes no input in Finder or any application and performs the following in a Run AppleScript action:

tell application "Finder"
    set topWnds to every window whose index is equal to 1 as list
    set cwd to target of first item of topWnds as alias
    tell application "Terminal" to activate
    tell application "System Events"
        keystroke "t" using {command down}
        keystroke "cd " & (POSIX path of cwd) as text
        key code 36
    end tell
end tell

Not too elegant, but it gets the path of finder's frontmost window, opens a new Terminal tab, and uses cd to get there.

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You can additionally use the clipboard utilities for the command line: pbcopy and pbpaste. You can pipe any path into pbcopy and access it from GUI utilities, e.g. the Finder's Go to Folder... command.

Answer 5

• Choose file
• Open context menue with the right mouse button
• And now push the "alt"-key
• Options are changing and you can copy the path

Answer 6

Check out DTERM. It allows you to quickly open a prompt to the current location. From there you can easily use an alias to copy the $PWD (echo $PWD | pbcopy), run a command on local files, and many other actions.

I find it very helpful in tying the Unix side of Mac OS X in with the graphical side.

Answer 7

The simple answer is no, there is no location bar in finder. No simple/easy way to copy and paste a path to a working directory.

Answer 8

If you Command+Click the title bar it will show a hierarchy of what directory you are in.

Here is a screenshot of it in action:

EDIT: Sorry, I didn't read the part about wanting to copy the path. If you are comfortable with the Terminal.cd into a directory and run pwd | pbcopy and you will have the current path in your clipboard.

Answer 9

You can also browse files and directories in a web browser this way on a mac:

file:///Volumes/Production/NBAA/17-379%20EBACE%202018/

file:///Volumes/Macintosh%20HD/Users/[userFolder]/Documents/

Answer 10

There is a contextual menu plugin called FilePathCM tha will get you the same result with a right click instead of a keyboard shortcut but it doesn't show a location bar.

http://www.limit-point.com/Utilities/FilePathCM.html

Answer 11

I think the best you can do without third-party software is to open an inspector window (option-command-I), which shows you the properties/"Get Info" of the currently selected item, and copy-paste from the "Where:" line. You can size the window down to be less obtrusive.

Answer 12

The path bar might be a good alternative. The path bar shows in which folder you are and let's you navigate back fastly. Unfortunately it doesn't let you copy paste an address directly.

How to show the path bar:

From Finder's View menu, check off "Show Path Bar" to turn on a clickable "breadcrumb" file path bar at the bottom of your Finder window, as shown. There you can click on any of the parent folders up the path of your current folder to navigate to it.