Buli Commander

An orthodox file manager plugin for Krita.

What is Buli Commander?

Buli Commander is a Python plugin made for Krita (free professional and open-source painting program).

Initially, my idea was to implement my own open dialog box to replace the default one from Krita, because the default one didn't satisfy me.

But as I'm used to work with orthodox file managers like Midnight Commander and Krusader, I finally decided to implement my own "open dialog box" as a complete file manager.

Disclaimer

Please note that current version is a beta version

While Buli Commander version is not published under version v1.0.0, please take in consideration the following points:

• There's bugs, some of them are known, some are not (yet?) known
• Implementation can be rewritten, so a bug can disappear naturally on next version... or not :-)
• All functionalities are not yet implemented or not yet fully implemented
• Current user interface and current functionalities are not definitive and can be changed on next version

Some screenshots

Main user interface: dual file panel mode

Main user interface: single file panel mode

Main user interface: single clipboard panel mode with different image sources

Settings interface: navigation

Settings interface: images default action

Copy file: window dialog if target file already exists

Advanced search engine: a complex, multi-source, multi-criteria and multi-output search definition

Export file list: export file list as a PDF document

Mass Rename: use of advanced rename formulas with highlighted syntax, popup completer and help, and rename result preview

Functionalities

Here a list of main functionalities:

• Dual panel interface, with different possible layouts

  • List and grid view mode
  • Directories tree view
  • Image information and preview

• Intuitive navigation bar

  • Home, Previous & Up directories
  • Manual input (ie: just type path by yourself) or Breadcrumbs mode
  • Bookmarks
  • Views
  • History
  • Last opened/saved documents access

• Quick filtering

  • Wildcards/Regular expression on file name
  • Show/hide backup files
  • Show/hide hidden files
  • Show/hide not managed (images) files

• Image information

  • File properties
  • Detailed image properties (format, dimension, mode/depth, color profile, ...)
  • Detailed Krita image properties (About, Author, embedded palettes, references images, used fonts, external files, ...)

• File manipulation

  • Copy/Move, with advanced "already exists" dialog window
  • Delete
  • Rename
    • Unitary rename
    • Mass rename with advanced possibilities

• Search file engine

  • A basic search file interface, for basic and most common searches
  • An advanced search file interface (node based), for most complex searches
  • Allows to search from defined path
    • Including or not sub-directories
    • Including or not hidden and backup files
  • Allows to filter on file properties
    • Name
    • Size
    • Date
    • ...
  • Allows to filter on image properties
    • Format
    • Dimension
    • Ratio
    • ...
  • Allows to easily export results

• Export files as list

  • Exported perimeter definition
  • Exported information selection (which file/image properties to export)
  • Different export format
    • Text
    • Markdown
    • CSV
    • PDF
    • Krita document
    • PNG/JPEG sequences
  • All format export provides miscellaneous options to define final format/rendering

• Files conversion to Krita, Png, Jpeg format

• Miscellaneous opening modes

  • Open as new document
  • Open as Krita document
  • Open as reference image
  • Open as layer
  • Open as file layer
  • Improved GIF/WEBP import file
  • Improved SVG import file (+SVGZ import)
  • Can read and import CBZ/CBT/CBR/CB7 documents

• Clipboard manager

  • Automatic/manual clipboard management
  • Miscellaneous sources
    • Image
    • URL (direct asynchronous download)
    • File
    • Krita's layers
  • Persistent clipboard
    • Everything in clipboard can be kept indefinitely

• Settings

  • Miscellaneous configuration settings to tune your Buli Commander a little bit :-)

Download, Install & Execute

Download

• ZIP ARCHIVE - v0.9.2b
• SOURCE

Installation

Plugin installation in Krita is not intuitive and needs some manipulation:

1. Open Krita and go to Tools -> Scripts -> Import Python Plugins... and select the bulicommander.zip archive and let the software handle it.
2. Restart Krita
3. To enable Buli Commander go to Settings -> Configure Krita... -> Python Plugin Manager and click the checkbox to the left of the field that says Buli Commander.
4. Restart Krita

Execute

When you want to execute Buli Commander, simply go to Tools -> Scripts and select Buli Commander.

Settings allows:

• To define a shortcut for Buli Commander
• To move menu entry in Krita's File menu

Tested platforms

Plugin has been tested with:

• Krita 5.1.1 (appimage) on Linux Debian 10

Plugin's life

What's new?

Note As I'm a little bit lazy and don't have so much time, there's currently no documentation... But detailled releases content provides some kind of documentation for some functionalities, don't hesitate to read them :-)

[2023-05-14] Version 0.9.2b >> Show detailed release content <<

• Fix bug Krita 5.2.0 Compatibility
• Improvement Krita 5.2.0 File layers

[2022-10-22] Version 0.9.1b >> Show detailed release content <<

• Improve Main interface - Reduce initialization time & folder analysis
• Fix bug Main interface - Toolbars are hidden

[2022-09-30] Version 0.9.0b >> Show detailed release content <<

• Improve Search engine - Reduce search execution time duration
• Improve Search engine - Limit results
• Improve File panels - Grid view mode - Smooth thumbnail scroll
• Improve Clipboard panels - Save item as
• Improve Clipboard panels - Remove item
• Improve User Interface - Override Krita Welcome Screen "Open file" dialog
• Improve User Interface - Implement "Save All"
• Improve File management - Improve mass renaming
• Fix bug - Search for condition generate python exception
• Review code to follow PEP8 recommendation
• Migrate to SPDX licenses headers

[2022-06-13] Version 0.8.0b >> Show detailed release content <<

• Improve File panels - Grid View mode - File/Image information
• Improve File panels - Toolbars
• Improve File panels - Markers
• Improve File panels - Multiple files selection
• Improve File panels - Quick filter - Icons
• Improve File panels - Breadcrumbs - Windows drives
• Improve File panels - Context menu - Status tip
• Improve User interface - Windows users menu icons
• Improve File formats - New supported files format
• Improve File formats - Open files

[2022-04-13] Version 0.7.1b >> Show detailed release content <<

• Fix bug about thumbnail loading

[2022-04-06] Version 0.7.0b >> Show detailed release content <<

• First Beta release!
• A big work to get plugin fully compatible with Windows OS
• Implement Search engine
• Improve file panel - New available columns fields with possibility to Select/Unselect visible columns
• Improve file panel - Grid view mode
• Improve file panel - Selections management
• Improve export files list - New available fields with possibility to Re-order fields
• Improve export files list - Save & Load export definitions
• Improve image information - Krita document version
• Improve image information - Krita animated document details
• Improve image information - Image ratio, pixels, dimension
• Improve "Open as" functionalities
• Improve performances
• Improve user interface
• New recognized files format
• Many (many-many) bugs fix

[2020-12-29] Version 0.6.0a >> Show detailed release content <<

• Implement Clipboard manager
• Implement tool Copy to clipboard
• Implement function Open file as reference image
• Implement context menu for files
• Improve Krita image information - Reference Images
• Fix bug - Active panel not highlighted

[2020-12-06] Version 0.5.0a >> Show detailed release content <<

• Implement Rename
• Implement tool Convert files
• Implement context menu for directories tree
• Implement shortcut for quick filter
• Improve Krita image information - Used fonts list
• Improve Krita image information - Embedded palettes
• Improve Krita Export file list - Square paper sizes
• Improve Krita Export file list - Thumbnail mode
• Fix bug - cropped path bar
• Fix bug - Invalid font
• Fix bug - Invalid key configuration

[2020-11-01] Version 0.4.0a >> Show detailed release content <<

• Implement Auto close
• Implement Auto open
• Implement Override Krita open file dialog
• Implement tool Export files list
• Improve notification system

[2020-09-27] Version 0.3.0a >>Show detailed release content<<

• Implement progress bar on background thumbnail load
• Implement progress bar on directory file content analysis
• Fix bug on Setting "cache" tab
• Add "copy" context menu on information panel
• Improve "Open as new" function
• Update theme loading (when user change Krita's interface theme, reload properly BC theme)
• Implement and improve copy/move/delete function

[2020-09-11] Version 0.2.0a >> Show detailed release content <<

• ORA file preview use (if exists) merged image preview instead of thumbnail
• Add BACKUP files list linked to a file
• Add FILE LAYERS files list linked to a KRA image
• Improve backup extension file management (take in account suffix from Krita setting + numbered backup files)

[2020-09-05] Version 0.1.1a

• Fix a dependency to unexisting library

[2020-09-05] Version 0.1.0a

• First public version

Bugs

Probably still a lot... :-)

---

WARNING

There's a very bad "random" bug that can occurs when opening Search window Currently not able to reproduce it systematically, it sometime randomly occurs When it occurs, there's a really bad Krita crash :-(

If you want to use the search function, it's higly recommended to save all your unsaved Krita documents!

---

What’s next?

Not able to define precisely in which order functionalities will be implemented, neither when, but here a list of what is currently expected for final v1.0.0 version:

• Improve styles (especially clear style as currently plugin is optimized for dark theme)
• Improve search engine UI (allows to resize nodes manually, context menu, copy/paste/duplicate, ...)
• Implement thumbnails generation with ICC profile taken in account
• Implement Documents tab
• Implement Exif/IPTC/XMP metadata read
• Implement search by color
• Implement search on Exif/IPTC/XMP metadata
• Implement search on invalid krita files (missing font, missing file layers, ...)
• Implement "Predefined condition" for search
• Implement Krita file analysis tool
• Implement a better layout editor for Export file list (add popup completer for available marker)

Additional todo list available on Github

License

Buli Commander is released under the GNU General Public License (version 3 or any later version).

Buli Commander is free software: you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation, either version 3 of the License, or any later version.

Buli Commander is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU General Public License for more details.

You should receive a copy of the GNU General Public License along with Buli Commander. If not, see https://www.gnu.org/licenses/.

Long story short: you're free to download, modify as well as redistribute Buli Commander as long as this ability is preserved and you give contributors proper credit. This is the same license under which Krita is released, ensuring compatibility between the two.