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A system-wide key-value store, that's distinct from file storage, seems like a pretty great idea. The Windows Registry is icky, we all know that, it somehow app
by rm445 3y ago
A system-wide key-value store, that's distinct from file storage, seems like a pretty great idea. The Windows Registry is icky, we all know that, it somehow appeared out of nowhere in Windows 95 already crusty as hell. But if it were designed by people with taste and discretion, would it be good?
- grenoire 3y agoWhen you give people the freedom to use the KV store as they wish, you inevitably run into a meta-problem whereby the way they write their data structures in to the KV store is varied across applications. I don't know if you could standardise this structure beyond enforcing applications to use an OS-assigned private store, but I don't see how that would work with portable executables etc. I suppose you'd need to be very opinionated for it to work, but people will still bodge it to make it work with their needs that your system doesn't natively satisfy (people putting JSON strings in the values, for example).
- mike_hock 3y agoAnd how is that a bigger problem than people using the filesystem any way they wish and putting arbitrary content in files?
- kevin_thibedeau 3y agoThe filesystem is manageable by users (with few exceptions). You can't easily discover which part of a registry hive is associated with an application.
- mike_hock 3y agoIt's precisely as discoverable as the filesystem. It's a tree like the filesystem. With names given to nodes by the application, just like the filesystem.