There is a powerful set of File Management features accessible by pressing the Actions button in a file list view. You can send files to other apps that support Apple's Document Interchange. You can create new folders, and rename/copy/move/delete existing files and folders. You can compress multiple files and folders into .zip archives, and you can unzip .zip archives. You can also send files via e-mail from GoodReader. You can mark files as read/unread, set/remove a password protection for individual files/folders, set/remove a star for a file or folder, extract files from PDF Portfolios, create new TXT files for further editing, create a task in Appigo Todo app, and copy special URL links to clipboard to allow other application to easily launch GoodReader and open a particular file.
You can sort files in a file list view by name, size and date. Both sort orders are available - ascending and descending. Use the Actions button, and the Sort button will appear at the top of the screen.
Find Files
Although it's not the part of Actions menu, we thought that we still should mention this feature here. Use it to quickly locate files and folders in one of four modes - by a file name match, recently read, recently added, starred. You can access this feature by pressing this button in the main file list view:
You can change the meaning or the word recently when finding files in recently read and recently added modes. This is done in Application Settings, General section. Possible values are: 1 day, 2 days, 3 days, 1 week, 2 weeks, 1 month.
Tips for Managing Files and Sending E-mail using Actions menu
- press Done button at the top of the screen to exit Actions mode and to hide File Management buttons
- press ">>" and "<<" buttons to see action buttons that are currently hidden
- most of File Management actions require selecting files/folders. Select or deselect files/folders by tapping them. Select All and Deselect All buttons are there to help you with this. Selected files are marked with a green dot.
- use Open In... button to open a selected file in another app that supports Document Interchange (iOS 4.0 or later)
- use New Folder button to create a new folder
- use Delete button to delete all selected files/folders (be careful - this can't be undone)
- use Rename button to rename a single selected file or folder. Our "Smart Rename" feature hides a filename extension, but still allows you to change it if necessary.
- use Copy and Move buttons to copy or move selected files/folders
- use Zip button to compress multiple files and folders into .zip archives. If any protected item was put into archive, this archive will also be protected.
- use Unzip button to extract existing .zip archives
- use E-Mail button to send selected files as e-mail attachments. Folders can't be e-mailed (but you can zip them first). Your outgoing mail server may provide a limitation for a total size of files that can be sent in a single message.
- use New TXT button to create a new empty TXT file for further editing. This feature is useful for comfortable offline reading or editing of a pure text copied from some other app (Safari, for example).
- use MarkRead and MarkUnread buttons to mark files and folders as read or unread. Read and unread files are distinguished by title's color - read files are shown in black, unread - in blue. Opening a file for reading or visiting a folder in normal (non-action) mode automatically marks it as read. You can see the list of recently read files using Find Files feature in Recently Read mode.
- use Star and Unstar buttons to visually mark/unmark files and folders with a star. To toggle a star for a single file or folder you can simply tap the star icon in Actions mode. You can quickly see the list of all starred files and folders using Find Files feature in Starred mode.
- use Protect and Unprotect buttons to set/remove password protection for individual files and folders. When trying to open protected files or folders you will be asked to enter a password (it must be previously set in Application Settings, General section). All protected files and folders share the same password, but this password is different from application startup password. Once you enter this password, GoodReader enters the private mode. It means that you can freely open protected files and folders until you quit GoodReader. You can see a small lock icon at the left bottom corner when you're in the private mode. The contents of protected folders is accessible via WiFi and via Find Files feature only if you're in the private mode. Also you're not allowed to copy or move protected files and folders that contain protected files, if you're not in the private mode. This feature uses iOS's Data Protection API, which actually encrypts your files, keeping your data confidential, even if your device gets lost or stolen. However, there are special procedures to perform, and also there are some limitations. Please be absolutely sure to read the Data Protection manual, if you want to actually encrypt your files. Be careful not to forget your password, because no way of retrieving or resetting this password is provided. However, if you have forgotten your password, the only way to reset it is to delete and reinstall the app, which will also erase all your files and settings.
- use PDFPortfolio button to extract all files embedded into a PDF Portfolio container file. GoodReader supports PDF Portfolios, but not for a direct reading, like it happens in Adobe Acrobat 9 or later. PDF Portfolios are complex PDF files with a very simple first page (usually it says something like "This file can be opened with Adobe Acrobat 9"), and a set of many PDF files embedded into this file, which is used simply as a container for other PDF files. GoodReader lets you extract those files from a PDF Portfolio for further reading them as normal PDF files.
- GoodReader offers integration with a popular high quality to-do app called Appigo Todo (requires a separate purchase and installation). Select a file and use Todo Task button to instantly create a task in Appigo Todo. Then, while viewing the task in Todo, you can click the action button (the GoodReader logo) and Todo will start GoodReader and open the file associated with this task.
- use Link button to copy a special URL link of a single selected file to clipboard. This URL link will have a special prefix gropen:// and will contain a full internal path to a selected file inside GoodReader's file storage. Any other iPhone application that is capable of opening URL links (for example, todo-type app like Todo or OmniFocus or notebook-type app) can use this URL link to automatically launch GoodReader and open a file being linked. For example, you can create a "Read this book" todo task in a todo application and associate an URL link with this task in such a way that tapping this URL link in that other application will launch GoodReader and open this file of interest. If you invoke the Link action with several selected files, several URL links separated by line-breaks will be copied to clipboard.