When I began on Debian 2.0 lo these many moons ago, I found a no-nonsense file manager called "TkDesk" that was absolutely phenomenal: multiple windows, very customizable, no cutesy this-that-and-the-others that get in the way or try to dumb-down the interface. I've tried using konqueror, nautilus, and ROX-Filer, and none of them really work the way I want to work.

<soapbox>
This, however funny it may be, is my primary complaint about Linux, and it well may be my own ignorance about what's available: I want a file manager, an "explorer" if you will, that doesn't try to give me icons that are a fifth my screen size at 1152x864; that won't force me to use one window and one window only to move around files; that won't try to anticipate my every move and make everything ridiculously easy for me (because that just makes it harder when you know what you're doing!); and that won't try to resize every chance it gets to read how many files are in the window.
</soapbox>

Any suggestions other than TkDesk? Thanks.

IMO, Rox can be customized to act the way you want. Actually, I think it is the fm that takes the least screen space that I know. Just say to it, not to resize, and choose the default view that is OK for you.

Yves.

Do you know if there's a way to have a view where there is a folder tree on the left and a subfolder+file list on the right? That's my main problem with ROX, though it's the best out of all of them that I've tried, by far.

AFAIK, no... ROX is simple and minimal. There's no tree.