Windows Explorer expands folders inappropriately, jumping the folder you expand to the bottom of the navigation pane

Anonymous

When using a left-side Navigation pane, if there are enough folders in the navigation pane such that you have a vertical scroll bar, if you click on a folder with the mouse (so as to see the contends in the right pane), then expand the folder (either by clicking on the + symbol or with the arrow key), then the left pane will automatically scroll up as far as it can such that the folder you expanded is still in view at the bottom of the pane. This removes the folder from under your mouse, where it would be expected to stay.

This is certainly a bug, as it only happens the first time you attempt to expand a folder in the manner. After doing it once, you can scroll the navigation (left) pane so that the folder in question is back in the middle of the pane, and it will expand and contract as expected, remaining under the mouse.

Locked Question. This question was migrated from the Microsoft Support Community. You can vote on whether it's helpful, but you can't add comments or replies or follow the question.

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Anonymous

Because many people seem to be interested in this issue, I'll post some info on my recent contact with Microsoft regarding this issue.

It seemed that everywhere this issue was talked about, all anybody would get from a Microsoft employee was a boilerplate "Thanks for your feedback" response. Never was the validity of the issue discussed or even acknowledged. I decided to write an email to the man in charge, Steve Ballmer, clearly laying out the problem with links to a walkthrough of the problem, this discussion, and the bug report with 220 votes (at the time). I realized that Steve would never read it himself, but I figured his email must get auto-forwarded to someone who might actually read it.

Two days later I got an email from an Advocacy Specialist from Microsoft saying a "grace case" has been created and the Windows Escalation Team would get in touch with me. The next day an Escalation Engineer emailed me asking when would be a good time to talk on the phone about the issues. So that he would be completely clear with what I was talking about, I recorded a screencast that walked through precisely what the issue was.

Edit: I've made a more condensed video demonstrating the "folder jump bug", view it here.

The end result of our talking was this:

The engineers are aware of this issue.
They may or may not provide a fix for it.

Nothing groundbreaking, but it's one more little push in the right direction. In my opinion, posting in this thread about the problem is virtually worthless. I would suggest:

Voting up and commenting on the bug here:

http://connect.microsoft.com/WindowsServerFeedback/feedback/details/621426/bug-when-expanding-folders-in-explorer-server-2008-r2-and-windows-7

He said that site is closely monitored by the dev team.

Writing intelligent, profanity-free complaints that mention how the bug negatively affects your everyday file-management workflow. Email these up the Microsoft food chain until you get a response. You are a paying customer and you deserve to be heard.

I got tired of dealing with it, so am now using XYplorer when doing heavy file management. It stings to have to pay for a decent file manager, but that is life. If this issue bothers you at all, please comment and vote on the bug, and write an email.

UPDATE 9/13/11: Bug is still present in Windows 8 Developer Preview, see it here.

UPDATE 1/30/12: Finally we have a public acknowledgment that this is in fact a bug that needs to be addressed, and it will apparently be fixed in the upcoming Windows 8 Beta. This is good news, but I know I will be using Win7 for at least another year or two, as will many, many others. We deserve a patch to fix this issue in Win7. Until that happens, keep bugging Microsoft about it.

FINAL THOUGHTS: This is a real bug with 645! votes on their feedback page, however MS has no plans to fix it for their Windows 7 users. The bug is fixed in Windows 8, which means nothing for a vast number of us who have no plans to upgrade. If this bug really gets under your skin, I suggest installing Classic Shell, which has been recommended a few times in this thread. You can choose to only install the 'Classic Explorer' feature which fixes this bug among others, and even brings back the old File Copy UI which is so nice to have back. I've been using it for many months now without any troubles.

Also, to those of you who think they find a solution to this problem by simply changing a few options settings somewhere... thank you for your desire to help all of us, but you must not be having the same problem, and please don't post your 'solution' here. If you read some of the 29 pages of this thread, you'll see every solution imaginable has been suggested. This is a bug in Explorer itself. If you use Windows 7 and plan to keep using it, your options are 1) use Classic Shell, or 2) use a third party file management tool, such as XYplorer. If you stumble across this thread because you just noticed this bug, please vote up the bug, and do either 1 or 2.

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Anonymous

2014-01-11T12:22:03+00:00

Sir:

Would you be so kind as to descibe what, in the view of the Design Team, the benefits are of this approach to scrolling the folder tree, compared to the alternative of having the opened folder scroll to the top? In my (unprofessional) view, the idea when opening a folder is to see and/or get to what's inside the folder you are opening. As such, scrolling the contents out of the folder pane seems (again to unprofessional me) a bit odd.

Thank you for your response. I always like to learn from true professionals.

Greetings,

R. Gigengack
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Anonymous

2013-12-29T11:39:19+00:00
Description

Classic Shell adds some missing features to Windows 7 and Vista like a classic start menu, toolbar for Explorer and others.

The project has moved to www.classicshell.net. Visit the new website to download the latest version.

Classic Shell Web Site

Features

Classic Start Menu for Windows Vista, Windows 7 and Windows 8 (with skins)

Toolbar for Windows Explorer

Classic copy UI (Vista and Windows 7 only)

Show file size in Explorer status bar (Vista and Windows 7 only)

Title bar and status bar for Internet Explorer (9 and up)

User Ratings 4.8 OUT OF 5 STARS

And it stops the Folder Jumping totally annoying Microsoft Special Feature (-;
There's one other tiny change you can make to Explorer, if you have the resources to do it :)

Windows Explorer has two panes - the file list on the right and the tree on the left. They are separated by a vertical line. You can adjust where this line is by grabbing it with the mouse pointer and moving it left or right, to make the tree narrower or wider, and the file list wider or narrower.

In Windows XP, the thickness of this line is determined by the "Active Window Border" setting in Display / Properties / Appearance / Advanced.

There is an identical setting in in Windows 7. Go to Personalize / Window Color and the same window appears, and you can adjust the Active Window Border. The only problem is whoever re-wrote Explorer in Windows 7 wasn't told or didn't know that this setting was also supposed to change the thickness of the vertical line between the two Explorer Panes.

Right now this line is only one or two pixels wide, making it very difficult to grab and making users waste even more time trying to get the display to show what they want. Maybe some people don't even realise it is movable.

I am fairly sure that this is impossible to correct, but I thought I'd ask.

So thanks a bundle Microsoft - yet another useful and important feature forgotten. Well done.
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Anonymous

2013-12-28T19:28:13+00:00

And it stops the Folder Jumping totally annoying Microsoft Special Feature (-;

Almost. If you're using x64 the jumps will still occur when you're using the x86 Explorer; typically when you're trying to save something from an x86 program like an internet browser or an older application.

This behavior is infuriating and the amount of times I've saved a file in the wrong folder or completely moved directories by accident is simply incredible. The entire purpose of Windows Explorer is to make navigating hard drives and directory structures viable. However, I've reverted to typing locations in save dialogs and I'm now beginning to wonder if it's really that much different to DOS.
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Anonymous

2013-12-28T19:17:52+00:00
Description

Classic Shell adds some missing features to Windows 7 and Vista like a classic start menu, toolbar for Explorer and others.

The project has moved to www.classicshell.net. Visit the new website to download the latest version.

Classic Shell Web Site

Features
- Classic Start Menu for Windows Vista, Windows 7 and Windows 8 (with skins)
- Toolbar for Windows Explorer
- Classic copy UI (Vista and Windows 7 only)
- Show file size in Explorer status bar (Vista and Windows 7 only)
- Title bar and status bar for Internet Explorer (9 and up)
User Ratings 4.8 OUT OF 5 STARS

And it stops the Folder Jumping totally annoying Microsoft Special Feature (-;
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