Dired invert selection

Question

I want to mark all files currently unmarked and simultaneously unmark all marked files. How do I do it?

Let's say I have a directory with *.png and and other formats. I want to filter only PNGs. Say, I did: % d.png and now want to select the rest, but not the PNG?

Answer 1

If you used %d to select the files (dired-flag-file-deletion), they are considered flagged, not marked. To mark files, you may use %m (dired-mark). The command t toggles the marked files (dired-toggle-marks); this was mentioned by event_jr's answer. To convert files from flagged to marked, use the command *cD* (dired-change-marks).

It seems the only command that operates on flagged files is x, which deletes them (dired-do-flagged-delete). The same can be achieved on marked files with D (dired-do-delete), and you can do much more on marked files, such as R (dired-do-rename). So apparently the only advantage of flagging are the convenient commands to flag "garbage" files, which you may use and then convert the flags to marks anyway.

Answer 2

t .................................... for toggle