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I was responding to your comment about hidden (.) files vs extended attributes. As much as I do not like Android - it does respect hidden files. I don't 'bothe

I was responding to your comment about hidden (.) files vs extended attributes. As much as I do not like Android - it does respect hidden files. I don't 'bother releasing stuff for Windows', as I said - for me it's not worth the pain.

delta_p_delta_x 1y ago
It's hard to tell how your commment was a sincere response rather than derision for anyone using or targeting Windows. There was nothing technical. Here's a technical response: There's nothing 'hidden' about dotfiles on UNIX-likes, unlike on Windows where, as I mentioned, there is such a thing that is exposed by the OS filesystem API (it's a normal attribute and can be straightforwardly set/unset with right-click -> Properties; not an extended attribute which refers to a very specific thing). That files and directories beginning with a full stop are hidden in `ls` was openly acknowledged as a bug[1] in the original implementation, that gave rise to 'a bad precedent'. Ergo all the repeated gnashing of teeth (see this very article) by UNIX-like consumers who end up noticing the dotfiles anyway, because a significant plurality of people use a variant of `ls -la` for the utility of its tabular output. [1]: https://web.archive.org/web/20141205101508/https://plus.google.com/+RobPikeTheHuman/posts/R58WgWwN9jp https://web.archive.org/web/20141205101508/https://plus.goog...
- smcleod 1y ago
  It's standard convention for (mostly GUI) applications to visually hide files and directories that start with a ., I don't know what you think a hidden folder is if it's not this and it has been widely accepted in the industry as a whole (except in Windows) for a very long time. What you seem to be confusing it with is file system ACLs, something that *nix for quite some time. In fact it was available on consumer desktop environments in the early 2000s - roughly the same era as Windows (when Microsoft brought their NTFS filesystem to the desktop). Anyway, don't feed the trolls and all that, you're welcome to enjoy your windows ecosystem - just don't expect all engineers to write their software specifically to cater for it.
  - delta_p_delta_x 1y ago
    I am confused. My point was that if engineers target Windows at all, they ought to do it properly, but you retorted with 'I don't target Windows'. Okay, well and good, then my advice isn't for you and developers like you. Then again, you said 'don't expect all engineers to write their software specifically to cater for it', seemingly ignoring my and essentially every parent commenter's plea for developers targeting non-Linux platforms to be good citizens on that platform, and adopt platform conventions. If you're not writing software for Windows, then sure, no need to think about Windows. If you are, or you are going to, then this platform convention business needs to happen and needs to be done correctly, whatever your thoughts on Windows, or, in the thread's case, macOS, where application data should go in `~/Library/Application\ Support` and not dot-dirs in $HOME. The conversation digressed into cherry-picking my explanation of 'hidden file'. I'm not sure the troll epithet is fair.

delta_p_delta_x 1y ago

It's hard to tell how your commment was a sincere response rather than derision for anyone using or targeting Windows. There was nothing technical. Here's a technical response: There's nothing 'hidden' about dotfiles on UNIX-likes, unlike on Windows where, as I mentioned, there is such a thing that is exposed by the OS filesystem API (it's a normal attribute and can be straightforwardly set/unset with right-click -> Properties; not an extended attribute which refers to a very specific thing). That files and directories beginning with a full stop are hidden in `ls` was openly acknowledged as a bug[1] in the original implementation, that gave rise to 'a bad precedent'. Ergo all the repeated gnashing of teeth (see this very article) by UNIX-like consumers who end up noticing the dotfiles anyway, because a significant plurality of people use a variant of `ls -la` for the utility of its tabular output. [1]: https://web.archive.org/web/20141205101508/https://plus.google.com/+RobPikeTheHuman/posts/R58WgWwN9jp https://web.archive.org/web/20141205101508/https://plus.goog...

smcleod 1y ago
It's standard convention for (mostly GUI) applications to visually hide files and directories that start with a ., I don't know what you think a hidden folder is if it's not this and it has been widely accepted in the industry as a whole (except in Windows) for a very long time. What you seem to be confusing it with is file system ACLs, something that *nix for quite some time. In fact it was available on consumer desktop environments in the early 2000s - roughly the same era as Windows (when Microsoft brought their NTFS filesystem to the desktop). Anyway, don't feed the trolls and all that, you're welcome to enjoy your windows ecosystem - just don't expect all engineers to write their software specifically to cater for it.
- delta_p_delta_x 1y ago
  I am confused. My point was that if engineers target Windows at all, they ought to do it properly, but you retorted with 'I don't target Windows'. Okay, well and good, then my advice isn't for you and developers like you. Then again, you said 'don't expect all engineers to write their software specifically to cater for it', seemingly ignoring my and essentially every parent commenter's plea for developers targeting non-Linux platforms to be good citizens on that platform, and adopt platform conventions. If you're not writing software for Windows, then sure, no need to think about Windows. If you are, or you are going to, then this platform convention business needs to happen and needs to be done correctly, whatever your thoughts on Windows, or, in the thread's case, macOS, where application data should go in `~/Library/Application\ Support` and not dot-dirs in $HOME. The conversation digressed into cherry-picking my explanation of 'hidden file'. I'm not sure the troll epithet is fair.