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When I open macOS Finder an for e.g. open in the tree view the folder Documents the tree view automatically opens all subfolders I opened the last time when I visited that folder. This is annoying as I have to close those folders before I can see where I want to go.

On my old MacBook, the behaviour is different, and Finder seem not to remember which folder I opened before. This is much faster and comfortable.

How can I adjust this behavior on my new setup?

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  • What's odd about this is that your new Mac is displaying correct behaviour. I'm at a loss as to how the old Mac is achieving this. Do you have some script/cron task etc running that will delete .DS_Store files?
    – Tetsujin
    Jun 28, 2018 at 17:34
  • @Tetsujin No script or task to manipulate .DS_Store files. In my darkest corner of my brain I remember that I did something to change the behaviour but I cannot remember what as it was six years ago. Even searching within my old laptop does not reveal anything. The problem is, once you are used to the behaviour I wish, the default behaviour seems uttermost stupid.
    – Martin Schlott
    Jul 4, 2018 at 7:21
  • You can opt/click to close all in a hierarchy, as a temp solution.
    – Tetsujin
    Jul 4, 2018 at 7:24

2 Answers 2

Reset to default
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There is currently no way to change this behaviour through Finder Preferences (at least as of macOS 10.13.5). The easiest way to achieve the desired outcome in Finder is to:

  • Cmd+A (selects all objects in the window)
  • Cmd+← (collapses all open folders)

Unfortunately, this is a keyboard fix but it is fairly quick and given that you are navigating Finder it seems to follow your able to quickly engage keyboard commands.

There is hope, while investigating how one could do this using AppleScript I found these references to Containers in the AppleScript Editor Dictionary for Finder Objects:

  • entire contents (specifier, r/o) : the entire contents of the container, including the contents of its children
  • expandable (boolean, r/o) : (NOT AVAILABLE YET) Is the container capable of being expanded as an outline?
  • expanded (boolean) : (NOT AVAILABLE YET) Is the container opened as an outline? (can only be set for containers viewed as lists)
  • completely expanded (boolean) : (NOT AVAILABLE YET) Are the container and all of its children opened as outlines? (can only be set for containers viewed as lists)

It appears that Apple may be providing the ability to do what your asking for through a supported interface in the future.

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  • This fix does not fix much unfortunately. Particularly if you expand some folder after that, it will expand all the nested folders again
    – user4600699
    Apr 17, 2021 at 10:23
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As often with Mac, it is easier than you think:

  • In list view Up and Down arrows will move up respectively down in list.
  • Left and Right arrows will close respectively open a folder in the list, as it was viewed last time.
  • In combination with Option, Left and Right arrows will collapse respectively expand selected folder.
  • If a folder was collapsed with Option + Left arrow, it will open like that if opened with Left arrow (only).

The same goes for entire folder content - the whole hierarchy with all subfolders expands and collapses with the Option key held down. And all subfolder will be collapsed (closed) next time they are viewed.

More: Option + Up and Down arrow will travel to the last respectively the first object in the list view, like Home and End.

Command + Up and Down arrow will travel (open) to parent respectively current folder.

Combination of Option+ Command + Arrow may give some unexpected behaviours, mostly it will be alright, sometimes one key too many will cancel out what you wanted to do.

Selecting many folders (like when doing Command + A and then Arrow) may also give some unexpected behaviours.

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    Welcome to Super User. Your answer would be much more helpful if it focused on answering the original question. Consider putting that part at the top and the rest as a separate section at the end.
    – I say Reinstate Monica
    Dec 9, 2018 at 2:08

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