A third browser view with bookmarks/favorites/links, groups and filters

I've been missing something like TextMate's project drawer from day one. I have different sets of files i work with depending on the context, and it becomes very tedious to navigate folder-trees. Having lots of horizontal tabs open is not an option. Saved tab sets (workspaces) could be a quick fix, but not what i want (horizontal tabs pales compared to vertical ones). Finder aliases are helpful locally.

My suggestion to improve the situation is to create a new browser view where you can have the most relevant files and folders, and group, sort and filter files and folders to your hearts content. This view could be for both local and remote editing at the same time, and all files could indicate with icons on the right whether they exist locally and/or remotely and are open or being edited (locally or remotely). Coloring of the location-icons depending on state (editing, open, closed) could be one way to do it.

To open a file that exists both places, you could click its location-icon or maybe use a modifier to choose. An alternative to this is to have a remote-/local-mode toggle for the whole view.

If this view could be browsed the same way you do in the browser now, you'd effectively have workspaces. A toggle or tab to see/handle open files as vertical tabs could be nice.