3 ms·

This is why one of my favorite features in the original MacOS filesystem was type/creator fields (four uppercase letters each). Yes, it was possible for develop

This is why one of my favorite features in the original MacOS filesystem was type/creator fields (four uppercase letters each). Yes, it was possible for developers to create collisions, but it was still better than the UNIX method of applying fragile heuristics to the file contents. IMO it would still be a good idea to replicate this (minus the four-character limitation) with a standardized extended attribute, falling back to the heuristic method only when that fails.

ken 7y ago
Type/creator codes were any 4-byte OSType, actually. ASCII values were commonly used, for obvious reasons, but not required.
- notacoward 7y ago
  I stand corrected. Thank you.
yrro 7y ago
The separation between type and creator had other beneficial side effects. The Type code told you which apps _could_ open a file (by drag and drop or via the file chooser dialog). The creator code told you which app _would_ be chosen when the file was opened in the Finder (e.g., double-clicked). So HTML documents I had created in some web authoring tool would open in it for editing, whereas those I had saved from a web browser would open in it for viewing. I don't remember it being possible to change either code using tools that shipped with the OS. I obtained a tool on one of MacFormat's early cover disks...
- dgacmu 7y ago
  ResEdit was the apple program that could change it. Unfortunately, I don't remember off the top of my head if it shipped with the system or only with some of the developer tools. I _think_ early versions had it.
  - wlesieutre 7y ago
    Fairly sure later versions didn't include ResEdit, but you could also set them via AppleScript in a pinch and they did ship with Script Editor
- Angostura 7y ago
  > I obtained a tool on one of MacFormat's early cover disks... Probably ResEdit?
wlesieutre 7y ago
My favorite part was that MacOS's user account permissions used those creator codes to decide whether you were allowed to run an application or not. Want to run the Unreal Tournament demo in the school computer lab? ResEdit its creator code to something you were allowed to run, and it'd fire right up. "RASM" was a favorite, belonging to the remote access status monitor utility. All users automatically had access to run it, and it didn't have any document relationships that were going to be confused by applying it to other applications.
tzs 7y ago
It also had some way of quickly finding what apps were on a volume and what file types they handled. This meant that if you had a file and did not have the correct app to open it, all you had to do was insert a floppy or CD that contained a Mac volume that had a copy of that app, and then you could open the file. Most apps would run fine off a CD, so you could keep a CD with all the big apps that you rarely used and just insert it whenever you had to deal with a file using one of those apps.

ken 7y ago

Type/creator codes were any 4-byte OSType, actually. ASCII values were commonly used, for obvious reasons, but not required.

notacoward 7y ago
I stand corrected. Thank you.

yrro 7y ago

The separation between type and creator had other beneficial side effects. The Type code told you which apps _could_ open a file (by drag and drop or via the file chooser dialog). The creator code told you which app _would_ be chosen when the file was opened in the Finder (e.g., double-clicked). So HTML documents I had created in some web authoring tool would open in it for editing, whereas those I had saved from a web browser would open in it for viewing. I don't remember it being possible to change either code using tools that shipped with the OS. I obtained a tool on one of MacFormat's early cover disks...

dgacmu 7y ago
ResEdit was the apple program that could change it. Unfortunately, I don't remember off the top of my head if it shipped with the system or only with some of the developer tools. I _think_ early versions had it.
- wlesieutre 7y ago
  Fairly sure later versions didn't include ResEdit, but you could also set them via AppleScript in a pinch and they did ship with Script Editor
Angostura 7y ago
> I obtained a tool on one of MacFormat's early cover disks... Probably ResEdit?

wlesieutre 7y ago

My favorite part was that MacOS's user account permissions used those creator codes to decide whether you were allowed to run an application or not. Want to run the Unreal Tournament demo in the school computer lab? ResEdit its creator code to something you were allowed to run, and it'd fire right up. "RASM" was a favorite, belonging to the remote access status monitor utility. All users automatically had access to run it, and it didn't have any document relationships that were going to be confused by applying it to other applications.

tzs 7y ago

It also had some way of quickly finding what apps were on a volume and what file types they handled. This meant that if you had a file and did not have the correct app to open it, all you had to do was insert a floppy or CD that contained a Mac volume that had a copy of that app, and then you could open the file. Most apps would run fine off a CD, so you could keep a CD with all the big apps that you rarely used and just insert it whenever you had to deal with a file using one of those apps.