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Quick View lets you read and edit an encrypted file without ever leaving a permanent decrypted copy on your disk. Instead of unlocking the file in-place, Secure Crypt decrypts it to a system temp directory, hands it off to whatever application normally opens that file type, and then waits. When you’re done editing, a single click re-encrypts the file with a brand-new salt and nonce and erases the temporary copy — all without touching the original .scrypt archive’s location. This makes Quick View the ideal workflow for day-to-day access to sensitive documents, and it is the only way to open files that were locked with the Force Password (Mandatory Lock) flag.

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How Quick View works

The full Quick View lifecycle proceeds as follows:
  1. Decrypt to temp. Secure Crypt reads the encrypted file, extracts the 1-byte flag, 16-byte salt, 12-byte nonce, and ciphertext, then decrypts using AES-256-GCM. The plaintext is written to a system-managed temporary directory (tempfile.mkdtemp()). For folders, the decrypted bytes are first unpacked from a ZIP archive into a temp subdirectory.
  2. Open in default app. The decrypted file (or folder) is opened using the operating system’s default handler — the same app that would open it if you double-clicked it normally.
  3. Floating Save & Relock dialog. A small always-on-top dialog appears with the message “File opened in temporary view mode. You can make edits directly.” and a single 🔒 SAVE EDITS & RELOCK button. This dialog stays on screen while you work.
  4. Save and relock. When you click SAVE EDITS & RELOCK, Secure Crypt reads the (now-edited) temp file back from disk, generates a fresh 16-byte salt and 12-byte nonce using os.urandom, re-encrypts the data with AES-256-GCM, and overwrites the original .scrypt or .scryptfold file. The same flag byte (including the M mandatory flag if present) is preserved in the new file.
  5. Cleanup. The entire temporary directory is deleted with shutil.rmtree. As a final privacy step, the clipboard is cleared — clipboard_clear() followed by clipboard_append('') — so any text you may have copied from the temp file is not left in memory.

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Quick View a file

1

Click 'QUICK VIEW FILE (Auto-Relock)'

At the top of the Secure Crypt window, click the ⚡ QUICK VIEW FILE (Auto-Relock) button.
2

Select the .scrypt file

A file picker opens filtered to *.scrypt files. Browse to and select the encrypted file you want to view.
3

Enter the password

A dialog prompts “Enter password to view this file:”. Type the correct password. If the password is wrong, you will see an error dialog titled “Decryption Error” with the message “Incorrect password or corrupted data.” and the operation is aborted.
4

File opens in the default application

The decrypted file is opened by the OS default handler. For example, a .docx file opens in your word processor, a .jpg opens in your image viewer, and a .txt opens in your text editor.
5

Make your edits and save inside the application

Edit the file as needed, then save it using the application’s own Save command (e.g., Ctrl+S / Cmd+S). Do not close Secure Crypt.
6

Close the application

Fully close the external application before proceeding. This releases any file locks that could block Secure Crypt from reading the updated temp file.
7

Click 'SAVE EDITS & RELOCK' in the floating dialog

Click 🔒 SAVE EDITS & RELOCK in the always-on-top dialog. Secure Crypt re-reads the temp file, re-encrypts it with a fresh salt and nonce, overwrites the original .scrypt file, deletes the temp directory, and clears the clipboard. A confirmation dialog shows “Changes saved. File re-locked.”
Always save your work inside the external application and close it before clicking SAVE EDITS & RELOCK. The relock step reads the temp file directly from disk. If the application still has the file open (for example, some Office applications hold an exclusive lock while the document is open), Secure Crypt will show an error dialog titled “Save Error” with the message “Could not save changes. Ensure file is closed.” and abort without modifying the original.

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Quick View a folder

1

Click 'QUICK VIEW FOLDER (Auto-Relock)'

Click the ⚡ QUICK VIEW FOLDER (Auto-Relock) button.
2

Select the .scryptfold file

A file picker opens filtered to *.scryptfold files. Select the encrypted folder archive.
3

Enter the password

Type the correct password when prompted.
4

Folder opens in the file manager

The decrypted folder tree is extracted to a temp subdirectory and opened by the OS default handler (typically your file manager). You can browse, open, and edit files inside it normally.
5

Edit files, save, and close all applications

Make your changes, save them, and close all applications that have files from the temp folder open.
6

Click 'SAVE EDITS & RELOCK'

Secure Crypt re-zips the temp folder, encrypts the resulting archive with a new salt and nonce, overwrites the original .scryptfold file, deletes the temp directory, and clears the clipboard.

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Opening encrypted files directly (Windows)

On Windows, Secure Crypt registers file associations for .scrypt and .scryptfold in the Windows registry the first time it runs (ve.reg_assoc() is called automatically on startup). This means you can open encrypted files directly from Windows Explorer without launching Secure Crypt manually:
  1. Double-click a .scrypt or .scryptfold file in Explorer.
  2. Secure Crypt launches with the file path passed as a command-line argument (sys.argv[1]).
  3. The main window is hidden automatically (root.withdraw()).
  4. A password prompt appears: “Enter password to view this file:” (or “…this folder:” for .scryptfold).
  5. After the correct password is entered, Quick View proceeds exactly as described above.
  6. When you click SAVE EDITS & RELOCK, the app closes automatically after saving.
This double-click workflow provides a seamless experience that feels identical to opening any ordinary file — except that your data is always encrypted at rest.

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Force Password mode

When a file is locked with the Force Password Every Time checkbox enabled, Secure Crypt writes an M flag byte at position 0 of the encrypted archive. Files carrying this flag are mandatory-lock files.
Mandatory-lock files can only be opened via Quick View. Attempting to use UNLOCK FILE or UNLOCK FOLDER on a mandatory-lock file will show an error dialog titled “Access Denied” with the message “Mandatory lock. Use Quick View.” and the permanent decryption will be blocked. This restriction cannot be bypassed without knowledge of the password, and it persists across every Quick View re-encryption cycle because the M flag is copied verbatim into each new encrypted file.
See the Locking Files guide for more detail on how to apply the Force Lock flag when encrypting.

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Closing the dialog without saving

If you close the floating Save & Relock dialog by clicking the ✕ button, Secure Crypt immediately deletes the temporary directory with shutil.rmtree and discards the dialog. Any edits you made to the temp file are lost. The original .scrypt file is left untouched — it still contains the data as it was before you started Quick View. There is no undo or recovery for discarded edits.If the file was opened via a Windows double-click (i.e., Secure Crypt was launched with the file path as a command-line argument), closing the dialog with ✕ also exits the application entirely.

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