Ubuntu 13.04 have fully absent compact mode. Nautilus allows only icon view and list view.
List view isn't the same as compact mode – well, it's easy to switch off unneeded columns, but what about multicolumn files display?
Is it possible to return habitual compact mode back?
Best Answer
You can try the Marlin file browser instead of Nautilus, it looks a lot like Nautilus but with lots of improvements and functions that have been dropped in Nautilus 3.6.
Learn more here (with screenshots): http://www.noobslab.com/2012/09/install-marlin-file-browser-in-ubuntu.html