VFS File Explorer
The VFS File Explorer browses a folder on any Apache VFS location: the local disk, a zip file, or a named connection such as S3, FTP or HDFS. It is not the File Explorer perspective, which stays on the project, and it is not the file dialog, which is still what Hop uses to open and save a file.
Open it from Tools → VFS File Explorer. The same browser can sit in the bottom panel while you work on a pipeline or workflow. Use the dock and undock buttons to move the current location between the window and that panel. Each host keeps its own tabs.
What you see
Each tab is one location.
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The location bar shows the folder you are in. Enter a path or a VFS URI to go there. Variables are resolved.
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The tree on the left lists folders and loads a folder when you expand it. Select more than one folder to copy, cut or delete them together.
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The table on the right lists the files and folders in the selected folder. You can sort by clicking a column. Name is always shown. Size, last modified, owner, extension and permissions can be turned off from the columns button. Owner and permissions stay empty when the VFS provider does not report them.
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The filter box limits the table to the current folder. It does not search subfolders.
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Show or hide hidden folders applies to the tree. Show or hide hidden files applies to the table. A hidden name starts with a dot. The two switches are independent.
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Bookmarks are the same list as in the file dialog, including the option that makes them global or per project.
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The status line shows the listing or file change that is running, how long it took, how many rows are listed and their size, and how many rows are selected and their size. Stop interrupts that work. Expand shows the recent operations.
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Open a new location adds a tab for the folder you are viewing. Ctrl+T does the same, and Cmd+T on macOS.
Double-click a folder to open it. Double-click a Hop file (a pipeline, a workflow, a text file, and so on) to open it in Hop. Double-click a zip, jar, tar, tgz or tbz2 archive to browse inside it.
Copy, rename and download
The folder toolbar copies, cuts, pastes, renames and deletes folders. Rename applies to one folder. Delete is set apart on the right-click menu so it is not next to the other actions.
The file toolbar copies, cuts, pastes and deletes the rows you select, and renames a file when exactly one file is selected. Download opens the VFS save dialog with that file’s name so you can store a copy somewhere else. Upload is next to it. Select one or more files, then choose the folder to place them in. That folder can be any VFS location, including a named cloud connection. Open as text file opens the file in a text editor even when Hop has a richer editor for it. Paste goes into the folder you are viewing. Copy and cut stay inside Hop: they are not the system clipboard. A folder is not copied into itself, its parent, or one of its own subfolders.
Named connections
On the editor of a file-storage connection (S3, MinIO, Azure, Google Storage, FTP, SFTP, WebDAV, Databricks VFS) the Explore button opens this browser at name:///.
An HDFS connection opens at name://.
That is the root of the connection.
A configured default path, such as an HDFS default root or a Databricks base path, is applied by the connection itself.
Save the connection first: Explore follows the saved definition, and saves unsaved edits before it opens.
From the File Explorer perspective
Right-click a file or folder in the File Explorer perspective and choose Open in VFS File Explorer. A folder opens itself. A file opens its parent folder. When the VFS File Explorer is already showing in the bottom panel, the folder is added there. Otherwise it opens in the window.