Windows 8 is Beautiful to Copy, Move and Delete Files and Folders

Copying, moving, renaming, and deleting are far and away the most heavily used features within Windows Explorer, representing 50% of total command usage (based on Windows 7 user experience and feedback). With the increasing amount of local storage measured in terabytes, containing photos (in multiple formats and very large files), music, and video, Copying, Moving and deleting files and folders (also called as “Copy Jobs”) are being taxed in new ways.

And this is also one of the most used features, and one Microsoft have not improved substantially in a long time.

Prior versions of Windows Explorer can handle these kinds of jobs, but Explorer isn’t optimized for high-volume jobs or for executing multiple copy jobs concurrently. However, in Windows 8 it looks great and also beautiful to perform Copy Jobs.

Until Windows 7, at least 5.61% of copy jobs fail to complete for a variety of different reasons ranging from network interruptions to people just cancelling the operation.

Also, most of us have a third-party copy management tool that already addresses these high-volume scenarios. Our telemetry data shows that the most popular of these add-ons (such as TeraCopy, FastCopy, and Copy Handler). But most people do not have a great tool for high-volume copy jobs.

Windows 8 targets three main improvements to the copy experience (Download Windows 8):

• One place to manage all copy jobs: Create one unified experience for managing and monitoring ongoing copy operations.
• Clear and concise: Remove distractions and give people the key information they need.
• User in control: Put people in control of their copy operations.

Also, there were four major improvements to the copy experience. Here is a short video demo (download it here: High quality MP4 | Low quality MP4) of these improvements.

Windows 8 have consolidated the copy experience. You can now review and control all the Explorer copy jobs currently executing in one combined UI. Windows 8 presents all pending copy jobs in this single dialog, saving you from having to navigate through multiple floating dialogs looking for the one you need.

Consolidated copy (fewer details view)

Now we have the  ability to pause, resume, and stop each copy operation currently underway. This gives us control over which copy jobs will complete first. You can also click any of the source or destination folders while the copy operation is taking place and open up those folders.

Pause (fewer details view)

To support this new ability to prioritize and decide, Microsoft have added a detailed view with a real-time throughput graph. Now each copy job shows the speed of data transfer, the transfer rate trend, and how much data in left to transfer. While this is not designed for benchmarking, in many cases it can provide a quick and easy way to assess what is going on for a particular job.

Here you can see three copy jobs underway:

Consolidated copy (more details view)

And here you can see how the speed of file transfer increases substantially when two of the copy jobs are paused:

Pause (more details view)

This is how Windows 8 makes it beautiful to copy, move, delete files and folders. And if you are seeing varying Estimated Time Remaining For the copy or move operation, that is because, estimating the time remaining to complete a copy is nearly impossible to do with any precision because there are many unpredictable and uncontrollable variables involved – for instance, how much network bandwidth will be available for the length of the copy job? Will your anti-virus software spin up and start scanning files? Will another application need to access the hard drive? Will the user start another copy job?

So, there wont be an exact estimated time. However, you will get an estimated estimated time. lol…