Browse and search

Overview

DooFiles shows the folders of your site in a tree on the left, and the folders and files of the folder you open in a list on the right. Everything starts at the folder where WordPress is installed. DooFiles never shows or opens anything outside it, except the Cloudflare R2 buckets you connect.

The folder tree

The tree starts at the folder where WordPress is installed, shown with its real name on your server, such as public_html.

• Click a folder to open it in the list.
• Click the arrow next to a folder to show or hide its subfolders without opening it.
• DooFiles loads each folder when you open it, so the tree stays fast on large sites.
• Click the arrow next to the top folder to fold the whole tree. DooFiles remembers it.
• With Cloudflare R2 connected, a Cloudflare R2 folder appears below the folder of your site, with each bucket inside.

DooFiles remembers which folders you left open in the tree, in this browser. To close them all at once, click the preferences icon next to File manager and click Close all in Open folders in the tree. See Preferences.

Open folders

• Click a folder in the list or in the tree to open it.
• Click a part of the breadcrumbs, above the list, to go back to that folder.
• Click the name of the open folder in the breadcrumbs to refresh it, for example after you change files by FTP.

The address of the page includes the folder you have open. The Back and Forward buttons of your browser move between the folders you visited, and you can bookmark a folder to come back to it later.

The file list

The list shows folders first, then files, in natural order: image-2.jpg comes before image-10.jpg, and capital letters do not change the order.

Click Name, Size, Files or Modified at the top of the list to sort by that column. Click it again to reverse the order. DooFiles remembers your choice in this browser. To go back to the default order, click Reset next to List order in Preferences.

On smaller screens, some columns step aside to leave room for the names: Permissions first, then Files.

Thumbnails

Images, videos and audio files show a small preview instead of their icon:

• Images: JPEG, PNG, GIF and WebP files, and other types such as AVIF or HEIC when your server can read them. DooFiles makes each thumbnail on your server the first time its row appears on screen.
• Videos: MP4, WebM, MOV, OGV and MKV files. Your browser takes a frame of the video when you upload it, or the first time its row appears on screen, and sends it to your server. The thumbnail of a video shows a ▶ over it.
• Audio: MP3, M4A, WAV, OGG, Opus and FLAC files that have a cover in their tags show it, with a ▶ over it, like videos. DooFiles makes it on your server, like the thumbnail of an image (DooFiles 1.0.12 or newer).

DooFiles keeps each thumbnail in its private folder, never next to your files. When a file changes, DooFiles makes its thumbnail again.

Some files keep their icon: very large images (over 50 megapixels or 50 MB), damaged files, SVG files, videos your browser cannot play, audio files without a cover, and the files of private folders when the site turns that off.

An administrator can turn thumbnails off for the whole site, or keep them fewer days, in the Thumbnails card of DooFiles › Files. See Thumbnails.

To turn thumbnails off only in this browser, click the preferences icon next to File manager and turn off Thumbnails. See Preferences.

Below the list, DooFiles shows how many folders and files the folder contains.

[SCREENSHOT_HERE: The file list sorted by Size, with the sort arrow on the Size column and the count of folders and files below the list]

Very large folders

DooFiles shows up to 5,000 items of a folder. In a folder with more, it shows the first 5,000 and tells you: This folder is very large; only part of it is shown. Use the search to find a file in it.

What DooFiles does not show

• Its own private folder, where it keeps the Trash and the backups of your files.
• The files that protect a private folder. The private folder itself appears in the list with a padlock.
• Anything outside the folder of WordPress, such as a shortcut (symbolic link) that points to another place on your server.
• The .doofiles folder of a Cloudflare R2 bucket, where DooFiles keeps what you delete from that bucket.

Search by name

1. Open the folder where you want to search. To search the whole site, open the top folder of the tree.
2. Type in Search in this folder…, in the toolbar.
3. Press Enter.

DooFiles searches the open folder and all its subfolders, and shows the results in the list, with the folder of each result under its name. Click a result to open it.

To go back to the folder, click Clear search above the results, or press Escape in the search box.

Search is not available inside a Cloudflare R2 bucket yet.

[SCREENSHOT_HERE: Search results for .php, with the header 12 results for ".php" in /wp-content, the folder of each result under its name and Clear search]

How names are matched

• Without * or ?, the name only needs to contain what you type.
• With * or ?, the whole name must match: * stands for any characters, and ? for exactly one.
• Capital letters do not matter: README finds readme.md.
• DooFiles searches names, not the content of the files.

Search limits

To keep your server responsive, a search stops at the first 300 results, or after 20 seconds. When that happens, DooFiles shows Only the first results are shown. Refine your search. Search in a smaller folder, or type a more precise name.

Private folders are not searched. Open a private folder to see what is inside it.

Troubleshooting

Need more help? Open a support ticket.