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Yes, I want to save the files locally to the disk. I don't use Figma, Slack, Notion, Facebook, Twitter (except sometimes for reading, using Nitter), or Google D

Yes, I want to save the files locally to the disk. I don't use Figma, Slack, Notion, Facebook, Twitter (except sometimes for reading, using Nitter), or Google Docs. You could save the HTML, but that isn't always ideal. Having defined file formats can help, which is the case when using email, NNTP, ActivityPub, IRC, etc. FTP is no good. There are better protocols, such as HTTP, Gopher, Gemini, Plan9, etc. I had made up a file format for serving directory listings by HTTP (but I don't know how to configure Apache, or to write an extension for Apache, to be able to use it). About "who think the browser should be for browsing documents and not virtualizing apps", it is badly designed for virtualizing apps. (I have thought of some better ways.) Also, the file system paradigm does not fail with shared content; you could have the program to mount a remote file system and then access it using local programs, if wanted. (You can then also easily to copy files between your computer and remotely, in this way, by using the standard operating system commands for doing so, and will work just as well with command-line or GUI. Similarly, for SQL databases, you can have an extension to expose remote data as a virtual table, and you can then easily copy data between locally and remotely.)

yzmtf2008 5y ago
> you could have the program to mount a remote file system and then access it using local programs, if wanted Sounds good. Where is such program? This is surely not a very novel idea, but where is it? Hint: - remote file systems suck. see: sshfs - the feature set you think are important are maybe not important enough to that many people
- john-aj 5y ago
  sshfs sucks, sure, but there are other file system protocols. Plan 9's 9fs is pretty cool.
- systoll 5y ago
  Not that I disagree with your overall point, but there are multiple products in that space. It's clearly not a deal-breaker for most; but if anyone's lamenting the lack of a GoogleDocsFS, they can get one: https://mountainduck.io https://mountainduck.io https://cloudmounter.net https://cloudmounter.net https://www.expandrive.com/desktop/ https://www.expandrive.com/desktop/ https://github.com/pranavmk98/gDocsFS https://github.com/pranavmk98/gDocsFS
- TeMPOraL 5y ago
  It's probably less that they suck, and more that they aren't designed for the workload the developers want. Files are a good idea when you have exclusive write access to them at any given moment; less so, when you want to support concurrent access. Real-time collaborative creation happens at a finer level of granularity - people are manipulating individual aspects of documents, objects in the application's internal model. This doesn't work well when your atomic unit of synchronization is entire database.
- tonyedgecombe 5y ago
  >Sounds good. Where is such program? This is surely not a very novel idea, but where is it? Every office in the nineties. Windows 95 + Office on the desktop and a Windows NT Server sharing the files. I'm not saying we should try and wind the clock back but it was a solved problem.
- yewenjie 5y ago
  I mount a cloud drive containing about 3 TB data on my laptop using rclone and it works great. And the cloud provider does not even have a native Linux client. I am so happy with rclone and will totally recommend it. https://github.com/rclone/rclone https://github.com/rclone/rclone
lmm 5y ago
> FTP is no good. There are better protocols, such as HTTP, Gopher, Gemini, Plan9, etc. I had made up a file format for serving directory listings by HTTP (but I don't know how to configure Apache, or to write an extension for Apache, to be able to use it). WebDAV is actually fine for this use case and supported everywhere (e.g. you can enable WebDAV for a certain directory in Apache, map it as a network drive in Windows, and everything will just work).
- pjerem 5y ago
  Right, I love WebDAV too, it’s a really underrated protocol. But tbh, it’s underrated because of the crappy Windows implementation causing explorer to hang as soon as a fly causes interference. It’s sad because WebDAV could have been (with some added ergonomics) the missing link between the filesystem-desktop metaphor and the cloud apps.
  - zzo38computer 5y ago
    There are some things that I don't really like about WebDAV, including the use of XML. However, the HTTP directory listing specification that I made has been described as being like a simpler and better (in some ways) version of WebDAV by some of the other people who have seen it. (It does do a few more things than only directory listings, but directory listings is its main intention.)
teddyh 5y ago
You say that FTP is no good, but did you consider the numerous FTP protocol extensions, including MLST/MLSD and FTP-over-TLS?
- LinAGKar 5y ago
  Does anyone support those? It still leaves the issue of it using multiple ports.
  - teddyh 5y ago
    > Does anyone support those? Maybe, maybe not, but even then, wouldn’t implementing those be easier (for both you and the rest of the world) than creating a completely new protocol? > It still leaves the issue of it using multiple ports. Aren’t multiple ports only an “issue” if you assume NAT (and CGNAT, shudder) as a natural state of things?
    - LinAGKar 5y ago
      >wouldn’t implementing those be easier (for both you and the rest of the world) than creating a completely new protocol? Maybe. One the other hand, WebDav and SFTP may be more widely supported than those extensions already. >Aren’t multiple ports only an “issue” if you assume NAT (and CGNAT, shudder) as a natural state of things? NAT is unfortunately something ubiquitous. And the multiple ports makes FTP harder to tunnel.

yzmtf2008 5y ago

> you could have the program to mount a remote file system and then access it using local programs, if wanted Sounds good. Where is such program? This is surely not a very novel idea, but where is it? Hint: - remote file systems suck. see: sshfs - the feature set you think are important are maybe not important enough to that many people

john-aj 5y ago
sshfs sucks, sure, but there are other file system protocols. Plan 9's 9fs is pretty cool.
systoll 5y ago
Not that I disagree with your overall point, but there are multiple products in that space. It's clearly not a deal-breaker for most; but if anyone's lamenting the lack of a GoogleDocsFS, they can get one: https://mountainduck.io https://mountainduck.io https://cloudmounter.net https://cloudmounter.net https://www.expandrive.com/desktop/ https://www.expandrive.com/desktop/ https://github.com/pranavmk98/gDocsFS https://github.com/pranavmk98/gDocsFS
TeMPOraL 5y ago
It's probably less that they suck, and more that they aren't designed for the workload the developers want. Files are a good idea when you have exclusive write access to them at any given moment; less so, when you want to support concurrent access. Real-time collaborative creation happens at a finer level of granularity - people are manipulating individual aspects of documents, objects in the application's internal model. This doesn't work well when your atomic unit of synchronization is entire database.
tonyedgecombe 5y ago
>Sounds good. Where is such program? This is surely not a very novel idea, but where is it? Every office in the nineties. Windows 95 + Office on the desktop and a Windows NT Server sharing the files. I'm not saying we should try and wind the clock back but it was a solved problem.
yewenjie 5y ago
I mount a cloud drive containing about 3 TB data on my laptop using rclone and it works great. And the cloud provider does not even have a native Linux client. I am so happy with rclone and will totally recommend it. https://github.com/rclone/rclone https://github.com/rclone/rclone

lmm 5y ago

> FTP is no good. There are better protocols, such as HTTP, Gopher, Gemini, Plan9, etc. I had made up a file format for serving directory listings by HTTP (but I don't know how to configure Apache, or to write an extension for Apache, to be able to use it). WebDAV is actually fine for this use case and supported everywhere (e.g. you can enable WebDAV for a certain directory in Apache, map it as a network drive in Windows, and everything will just work).

pjerem 5y ago
Right, I love WebDAV too, it’s a really underrated protocol. But tbh, it’s underrated because of the crappy Windows implementation causing explorer to hang as soon as a fly causes interference. It’s sad because WebDAV could have been (with some added ergonomics) the missing link between the filesystem-desktop metaphor and the cloud apps.
- zzo38computer 5y ago
  There are some things that I don't really like about WebDAV, including the use of XML. However, the HTTP directory listing specification that I made has been described as being like a simpler and better (in some ways) version of WebDAV by some of the other people who have seen it. (It does do a few more things than only directory listings, but directory listings is its main intention.)

teddyh 5y ago

You say that FTP is no good, but did you consider the numerous FTP protocol extensions, including MLST/MLSD and FTP-over-TLS?

LinAGKar 5y ago
Does anyone support those? It still leaves the issue of it using multiple ports.
- teddyh 5y ago
  > Does anyone support those? Maybe, maybe not, but even then, wouldn’t implementing those be easier (for both you and the rest of the world) than creating a completely new protocol? > It still leaves the issue of it using multiple ports. Aren’t multiple ports only an “issue” if you assume NAT (and CGNAT, shudder) as a natural state of things?
  - LinAGKar 5y ago
    >wouldn’t implementing those be easier (for both you and the rest of the world) than creating a completely new protocol? Maybe. One the other hand, WebDav and SFTP may be more widely supported than those extensions already. >Aren’t multiple ports only an “issue” if you assume NAT (and CGNAT, shudder) as a natural state of things? NAT is unfortunately something ubiquitous. And the multiple ports makes FTP harder to tunnel.