Selecting root in 'save as'-style folder tree

Question

I've got a tree structure equivalent to folders and files: you can save items and arrange them into folders. The current design is:

Folder
  - Item
  - Item
Folder
  - Folder
    - Item

When the user is asked to save an item, they can select a specific folder to save in that folder. However, the question is: how do they select to save in the root, alongside the top level folders?

I can only think of two options:

• Show root item, which can be selected
• A click in the tree area but not on an item deselects all items

Are there any better ways, and, if not, which of those two options would provide the best experience?

EDIT: I don't want an answer which is "do this", I want an answer that says "do this because [...] which is better than the alternative because [...]".

Answer 1

I'd choose Show root item, which can be selected option.

• it is visible and obvious to user. You can also label it as /(root) etc. to increase visibility
• root selection is consistent with selection of other foolders, while the second option is a tricky
• expand the clicking area to whole the row, not the name only. It will speed up selection according to Fitts' law
• to simplify dialog you could display the folders only as item names have no sense in the context of folder selection

Answer 2

Typically you would use

/
/folder
/folder/item.ext

It is the norm in most file browsers, and what many people are used to doing. It may be good, however, to change your layout instead of calling it (root), which is something that the majority of users have absolutely no idea what that would be to, (username). So it would read

Username
    Folder
      -Item
      -Item
    Folder
      -Item
      -Item