incorrect "date modified" information folder (long-lasting problem with MacOS)

I am having a similar issue, the folder dates are not updating, when a new file is added. See the attached Visual.

The Finals folder, is the latest, shouldn't this folder reflect the latest date, as well as the job folder too?

I am running Catalina 10.15.7, this issue has been present for the past year or so. It's not Catalina. Disk Utility doesn't solve it.

Selecting Date Modified in the view panel, is an assumption, if dates of folders and files, are not accurate.

If this issue has been addressed, accept my apology and please send me a link, to the fix.

Thanks in advance!

I think you are misunderstanding what "Date Modified" means.

Say you have an empty folder called "A" on your desktop, and the "Date Modified" of this folder is, say, yesterday evening.

Somewhere on your drive you have:, "file1" with Date somewhere last year; and "folder2" with Date, say, January 1 of this year.

Drag both file1 and folder2 into your folder "A".

What should become of "A"'s modified date?

Option 1: now

Option 2: January 1

Option 3: last year

Option 4: yesterday

The correct answer is "now", because that is when the folder was last modified.

So effectively this is, by design, a more recent date than any of the files and folders inside. And that is as it should be.

Apple stores a hidden file in each folder that you access using the Finder. Even if you just open the folder and make no change to the data, it will create this file and update the date on the folder.

You can use Spotlight to find files based on the modification date.

I guess I don't understand why you want to view the date modified of a folder. That modification date has absolutely nothing to do with the contents of the folder, so I don't see what value it has whether correct or incorrect.

I just search for the items and order by date modified. You could use Recents, but that uses metadata that must be set. Better to creat your own search folder to show most recent items.

No matter how much you want it to work differently, it won’t.

You could use List or Column view and sort by date modified. Then you could easily see what’s in each of the other folders.

Apple doesn’t speak publicly about much of anything.

You want the OS to work in a way it is not designed to work. As it hasn’t worked that way in over 30 years, I wouldn’t sit around hoping it changes.

None of us here can fix your problem. If you want that fixed you need to ask Apple. There is nothing we can do except to provide advice on how to work around the issue you’re having because we cannot fix it.

guvencs wrote:

To me, this does not make sense.

That's good. You've taken your first step into a larger world.