File managers that treat hidden files as an expert secret often hide the control in a way no tester we have sat with will invent. A long-press on the title. A tap seven times on the version number. A folder named .settings that is itself hidden.
We ran four sessions in November with people who already keep documents on the phone: invoices, school letters, scans of MyKad. The task was to display names that begin with a dot, because a previous backup had stored a folder that way. We did not say “hidden files.”
Two testers opened Settings and found a switch labelled Show system files. That wording helped one of them and confused the other, who said system files sounded like something that would break the phone. Two other testers never left the folder view. They pulled to refresh. They searched for the folder name. They did not look for a control.
The build that required seven taps on the version number produced a long silence and then laughter. Nobody was going to do that. A secret gesture is not a setting. It is a riddle, and riddles do not belong in a utility a person uses to find a scanned letter.
If hidden files can contain a person’s own backups, the switch belongs in the ordinary settings list, with a sentence about what will appear. If you are afraid beginners will turn it on, write the consequence next to the switch. Do not make the switch a secret.