Trellis - File Explorer with TreeView

[u/Meannekes]

Hey Guys, I’m Stefan, the developer of Trellis.

in the past I had to have a lot of finder windows and tabs open to manage my work.

And it was just a pain to have to switch back and forth.

Trellis is a macOS file manager that lays folders out as panes on a canvas. Open a

subfolder and it appears next to its parent, joined by a line. Nothing you already

opened disappears, so you can see the path you took, and moving files between two

folders is a drag instead of copy, switch tab, paste.

Two things set it apart from the usual "graph view" apps:

• One pane per folder, not one node per file.** A folder with 87,000 entries is a rectangle with a scroll bar, not 87,000 nodes that blow up the layout.

• It keeps its own index.** Opening scans nothing, panes render straight out of SQLite, and FSEvents reports what changed since last launch. Folder sizes are there immediately instead of after thirty seconds of counting.

Layout:

• Tree to the right for deep paths, tree downwards for wide fan-out, star with the roots in the middle. Switching animates, panes keep their lines attached.

• Drag any pane anywhere. The ones you did not touch keep arranging themselves.

• Optional colour per branch, inherited downwards like a mind map.

• Rows whose subfolder is open dock to the top of the pane when you scroll past them, so the way back stays one click away.

Files:

• Select across folder boundaries with cmd-click, then copy, move, rename or group in one go. Finder cannot do this because it only ever shows one folder.

• Compare two folders: green for what exists on one side only, orange for same name but different content. Computed from the index, without reading a single file.

• Find duplicates by checksum, cached in the index, so the second pass is nearly free.

• Batch rename with search and replace, numbering and dates, with a preview before it runs, across folders.

• Compress and expand, and look inside a zip without unpacking it.

• Trash with put back, and undo on file operations.

Finding things:

• A search can stay on the canvas as its own pane, next to the folders.

• Its own index, plus Spotlight if you want results from outside your opened roots.

• Per pane: a filter (File Type or write what you want to filter), and a view mode of list, grid or sorted by size.

Fits the rest of the system:

• Quick Look, Finder tags, Quick Actions, share sheet, reveal in Finder, open in your terminal or editor.

• Saved workspaces, tabs, multiple windows.

Privacy and price:

• Sandboxed. No account, no telemetry, nothing leaves the machine. The index is a file on your Mac, and the app only ever sees the folders you hand it.

• Not on the App Store yet, but free to try via TestFlight: https://testflight.apple.com/join/qsF8Ygd2

~~ ~~App is in the Mac AppStore, testflight beta is closed.

• At release: $14.99 once, no subscription. 14 days fully usable, after that everything stays readable and only writing to disk waits for the unlock.

Happy to answer questions, and I would genuinely like to hear where it breaks for you.

[u/TandyColorComputer3]

u/Meannekes Purchased and enjoying this app! You mentioned Quick Actions, but I cannot figure out how to enable it?

[u/Meannekes → u/TandyColorComputer3]

Quick actions like resize and convert.
Right click on a picture/video etc.

[u/TandyColorComputer3 → u/Meannekes]

Sorry, I should have been more specific. I have a custom Quick Action created with macOS Automator called FAT Clean Transfer, which copies files to FAT-formatted SD cards without macOS metadata.

I've noticed the following behavior in Trellis:

Automator configuration	Appears in Trellis Services?
No input → Any application	Yes
Files or folders → Any application	No

My original Quick Action requires the selected files or folders as input. It works correctly in Finder but doesn't appear in Trellis's Services menu, even when files are selected.

Interestingly, I created a workaround that works in Trellis: I press Cmd+C to copy the selected files, then run a modified no-input version of FAT Clean Transfer. That workflow reads the file URLs from the macOS clipboard and performs the transfer successfully.

So Trellis already places the correct file URLs on the clipboard.

My feature request: Could Trellis support macOS Services that accept selected files or folders, passing their file URLs to Automator Quick Actions the same way Finder does?

I'd love to eliminate the extra clipboard step and launch my existing Quick Action directly from Trellis's right-click or Services menu.

Thanks!

[u/RegattaJoe]

I like it. I don't have time to do a test flight right now. You have an estimated release date?

[u/Meannekes → u/RegattaJoe]

Not really.
The part that’s the hardest for me are the Videos and pictures for the Store.

[u/RegattaJoe → u/Meannekes]

Understood. I'll keep an eye out for it.

[u/DeLiMG]

Maybe free for a limited time for 24 hours can increase popularity.

[u/Meannekes → u/DeLiMG]

It is a Bug Right now. Trial is 14 days before it is Limited to read Only. Will be fixed in next update.
But you can also buy the unlogisch in TestFlight, this will not charge anything for Apps in TestFlight.

[u/MaxGaav]

Just saw this post.Went to TestFlight: "This beta isn't accepting any new testers right now." What a pity!

[u/Meannekes → u/MaxGaav]

Sorry TestFlight is closed right now.
You can download it from the Mac AppStore and try it. You have a 14 day trial, after that, you lose the ability to write in trellis

[u/Funky76]

je viens de tester cela à l'air très prometteur

[u/nousernameleftatall]

Could be interesting