The add-on keeps Anki’s original List view, while adding three Explorer-style views:
Grid, Gallery, and Compact views
Decks displayed as folders, with subdecks inside their parent decks
Cards and folders shown together in the same window
Front and Back previews on every card thumbnail
Rendered card preview that respects the card template and styling
Adjustable size and pinch/Ctrl+wheel zoom
Back and Forward navigation with an address bar
Search within the current deck and its subdecks, or search everywhere
Anki sidebar filters available through a compact Filter menu
Side editor or rendered preview that opens only when a card is selected
Arrow-key navigation that updates the editor or preview
Cut, copy, and paste support for cards and decks
Context menus for creating and managing cards and decks
Sorting, grouping, card-state information, tags, due dates, and intervals
A bottom counter showing X flashcards · Y decks in Cards mode and X notes · Y decks in Notes mode
Responsive card tiles that automatically fill the available window
Following the feedback from my last post, I also corrected several structural issues:
Notes mode now represents notes properly instead of treating them like cards.
Thumbnail fronts and backs are generated from their respective card templates.
Subdeck cards appear only inside their own deck folders.
The rendered preview now loads images correctly and preserves custom card CSS, colours, and backgrounds.
Explorer searches remain visually empty while navigating instead of exposing internal deck: queries.
Empty decks and unnecessary deck filters are hidden.
The interface no longer opens the side panel automatically while moving between folders.
The goal is to make browsing a large Anki collection feel closer to using Windows File Explorer, Directory Opus, or Solid Explorer—without replacing Anki’s normal Browser workflow.
It is still under development, so I would really appreciate feedback, bug reports, and suggestions—especially from people using custom note types and heavily styled card templates.
I voiced my concerns about the design of this add-on (and some of its claims) when you first posted it on r/Anki, so I won’t repeat them here. When you reposted it there 2d later [now deleted] – you seemed to be trying to disconnect it from the critiques on the original thread. And now posting it here, that seems even more the case.
Judging solely from from the description you gave here, you (or your AI coding partner) have made some updates to address some of the problems. But it’s not clear that you (or your AI coding partner) understand the most significant of the issues I raised, because those have still not been addressed.
Adding:
Since you keep reposting it separately without addressing the issues, I’ll just add those links here for reference.
Thank you for comment. I mentioned it even in my last comment to you. That I incorporated, what you mentioned in your last message, in the add on. Please I just wish to make it better. ( I deleted my one of the post on this because Mod told me to update things in my old post ) But can you tell me problems again here. I’d try my best to work on them.
I’m not sure why checkboxes are used for selection when only one value can be chosen, but never mind—let’s leave it at that.
However, the preview feature doesn’t work very well on Windows 10, even though the standard version has no issues. The back of the card doesn’t always display the code—or perhaps it fails to execute if there’s JavaScript involved.
That said, the ability to quickly preview multiple cards could be useful. You know how it is—sometimes people select 4–8 similar items and want to quickly compare their appearance.
Of course, this requires testing with a large number of cards and note types to check for potential issues (like the ones mentioned earlier). That involves a great deal of work and effort.
And please, add at least a few pictures to the description. As the saying goes, it’s better to see something once than to hear about it a hundred times.
And by the way, you have the name “Browser Visual Toolkit Combined v1.5.9 (Persistent Grid Reflow Fix),” but the page at https://ankiweb.net/shared/info/522494534 lists it as “Anki Browse Explorer.” If I search for “Browser Visual Toolkit Combined,” I won’t find it. It really should be consistent—the name ought to be the same in both places. You don’t always have to include the version number; otherwise, if you change it tomorrow, you’ll have to update the name again. If you plan to keep it the same for at least a year, then including the version in the name might be okay.
That’s a good add-on idea, occasionally there are requests to enhance the browse UI but very few add-ons are available for browse, so I think such users will like it.
I have updated the add-on with the concerns you had. Now the black circle doessn’t appear wherever audio is present. Also, the gallery view has rendered cards. I have also added visual mode, which opens flashcards like images in their rendered format. Thanks for your feedback. It really helpe to work on some of the basic things
