7 ms·

Most people don't understand hierarchical filesystems. I understand that and that's fine. As designers and programmers, we should be enabling those people to

by decode 18y ago

Most people don't understand hierarchical filesystems. I understand that and that's fine. As designers and programmers, we should be enabling those people to have control over and access to their stuff in a way that they can use. But I do understand hierarchical filesystems, so why would I want to do things the same way as people that don't? I don't use notepad.exe just because vim is too confusing for most people, either. I installed iTunes once and it took me a couple of confused minutes to figure out that I couldn't play a file in it. First you have to teach the app about all of the music that I might someday want to play, then you can finally choose one of those and play it. But I know where my music files are on the disk and I just want to play them. To use Gruber's analogy, I wanted to type 'print "Hello World"' and it wanted me to start defining includes. In the same way, I store my information in text files on the disk. They're arranged in a way that makes sense to me. They're searchable, portable, and small. And it works great for me.

jodrellblank 18y ago
I do understand hierarchical filesystems, so why would I want to do things the same way as people that don't? The filesystem isn't relevant to what either of you want to do - namely, start taking notes, and, not lose them if you forget to save them. Sure, save them wherever you like however you like - but I bet you start with "I need to make a note of this phonenumber" and not "I need to create ~/data/contacts/business/suppliers/joans.computers" so I can put this phonenumber in it".
- anamax 18y ago
  > I bet you start with "I need to make a note of this phonenumber" and not "I need to create ~/data/contacts/business/suppliers/joans.computers" so I can put this phonenumber in it". I only save things that think that I'll want to find some time in the future. As a result, I don't think "I need to make a note of this phone number". Instead, I ask something like "How do I make a note of this phone number so I can find it again?" and then I think "I should put it {some place}". Yes, hierarchical file systems are merely one of the many ways to implement "{some place}", but that doesn't make "{some place}" unimportant, irrelevant, or unnecessary.
- cturner 18y ago
  Interesting. I think your point is generally good but that phone numbers is an example against it. I tend to document stuff using the second approach, because I'm documenting for lookup. Phone numbers are a case in point - I always have it in front of me on a scrap of paper, but want to enter it into the appropriate page and place of our wiki where I or a colleague will be able to quickly recall it later. I'm creating it with the lookup in mind. Whereas if I'm opening a document just to play around with ideas I won't be doing that, and most documents start that way. I think this is why Word has so far won the field in mainstream document production. Word is a superb tool for prototyping and terrible in almost every aspect of structuring data for its long-term use.
JulianMorrison 18y ago
Hierarchical filesystems are primitive ops. How you use your filesystem, that's a layer above - and a lot of it is convention not necessity, defined in the age of the Apple beige toaster and preserved by generations of don't-make-me-think. File, save, save-as: those are older than the commodity hard drive. Lets imagine different conventions. As soon as you start typing it puts a file in $HOME/Documents (or a configurable alternative). If the application is amenable to guessing a title (like the first entry in Heading 1), then it uses that, otherwise it goes with the usual "untitled". The menu ops are File -> Open, File -> Save, File -> Save a copy, File -> Set name and File -> Move. The last file opens if you stop and restart. Every single operation gets lazy-queued for flush to disk on an activity log (more than just auto-save: preserve every undo-able op). Save means "commit my changes to the canonical copy and clear the activity log". All of those still use the hierarchical file system. They just use it in a way that makes modern sense.
- anthonyrubin 18y ago
  What if a box were provided near the top of the document with the document's current name? To rename the file you simply type the new name in the box. Users should never really have to worry about saving. Google Docs does a good job of keeping documents saved without any need for user intervention.
  - JulianMorrison 18y ago
    A box with a name would be good, but you miss one important function of saving I took pains to preserve: it is the action which turns tentative changes to the file into permanent ones. You want to preserve those tentative changes, but you don't want to put them in the actual file until the user commands it.
    - smokinn 18y ago
      True, with current software you don't want to save tentative changes but the only reason for that is that your "undo" history is lost the instant you close a program. If you could undo changes through the entire history of the document explicitly saving becomes pointless.
ganley 18y ago
Amen. And iTunes is a total nightmare if you don't want it to store the files where it wants to. I'm all for abstracting away the file system, but the fact remains that there are files under there, so don't make it difficult for me to deal at that level when I have to.
- GHFigs 18y ago
  I wouldn't call unchecking one preference a "total nightmare".
  - spiralhead 18y ago
    However, Mr. Figs, and this is speaking from personal experience, if you happen to store your files on an external USB drive, and you happen to launch itunes at a moment when the drive is disconnected from your laptop, Itunes will revert to its default folder--forcing me to think about things I shouldn't be polluting my brain with.
    - derefr 18y ago
      I actually find that handy for use with my laptop--unplug the HD, import my "core library" (about 30GB), then plug it in and import the rest (over 200GB at this point.) Thus, when I'm out and want to listen to something, I still have all my favorite songs; just not everything (which wouldn't fit on my laptop's HD, anyway.) Basically, it turns the internal HD into a not-too-smart cache of the external one. (On that note, if there's a program that provides this internal/external storage caching mechanism more intelligently and on a larger scale, I'dclove to hear about it.)
  - randallsquared 18y ago
    If you're not expecting that, and have mostly empty or invalid ID3 information, because you have habitually kept metadata in the filename and directory hierarchy, iTunes will destroy your library. Everything becomes Unknown Title 243 by Unknown Artist 14, and by the time you notice (because who's expecting an MP3 player to rearrange all the files on disk!?), the only way to fix this is by listening to each track and trying to figure out via Google what song it is. This happened to me in 2003 when I switched from Linux to Mac. I still get a little worked up over that, even though nowadays I just let iTunes manage everything and throw away the original files after I rip something.
d0mine 18y ago
Most people don't understand hierarchical filesystems. It might not be the best way to organize most files, but people do understand hierarchical systems. There are too many examples of hierarchies in everyday life.

by decode 18y ago

jodrellblank 18y ago

I do understand hierarchical filesystems, so why would I want to do things the same way as people that don't? The filesystem isn't relevant to what either of you want to do - namely, start taking notes, and, not lose them if you forget to save them. Sure, save them wherever you like however you like - but I bet you start with "I need to make a note of this phonenumber" and not "I need to create ~/data/contacts/business/suppliers/joans.computers" so I can put this phonenumber in it".

anamax 18y ago
> I bet you start with "I need to make a note of this phonenumber" and not "I need to create ~/data/contacts/business/suppliers/joans.computers" so I can put this phonenumber in it". I only save things that think that I'll want to find some time in the future. As a result, I don't think "I need to make a note of this phone number". Instead, I ask something like "How do I make a note of this phone number so I can find it again?" and then I think "I should put it {some place}". Yes, hierarchical file systems are merely one of the many ways to implement "{some place}", but that doesn't make "{some place}" unimportant, irrelevant, or unnecessary.
cturner 18y ago
Interesting. I think your point is generally good but that phone numbers is an example against it. I tend to document stuff using the second approach, because I'm documenting for lookup. Phone numbers are a case in point - I always have it in front of me on a scrap of paper, but want to enter it into the appropriate page and place of our wiki where I or a colleague will be able to quickly recall it later. I'm creating it with the lookup in mind. Whereas if I'm opening a document just to play around with ideas I won't be doing that, and most documents start that way. I think this is why Word has so far won the field in mainstream document production. Word is a superb tool for prototyping and terrible in almost every aspect of structuring data for its long-term use.

JulianMorrison 18y ago

Hierarchical filesystems are primitive ops. How you use your filesystem, that's a layer above - and a lot of it is convention not necessity, defined in the age of the Apple beige toaster and preserved by generations of don't-make-me-think. File, save, save-as: those are older than the commodity hard drive. Lets imagine different conventions. As soon as you start typing it puts a file in $HOME/Documents (or a configurable alternative). If the application is amenable to guessing a title (like the first entry in Heading 1), then it uses that, otherwise it goes with the usual "untitled". The menu ops are File -> Open, File -> Save, File -> Save a copy, File -> Set name and File -> Move. The last file opens if you stop and restart. Every single operation gets lazy-queued for flush to disk on an activity log (more than just auto-save: preserve every undo-able op). Save means "commit my changes to the canonical copy and clear the activity log". All of those still use the hierarchical file system. They just use it in a way that makes modern sense.

anthonyrubin 18y ago
What if a box were provided near the top of the document with the document's current name? To rename the file you simply type the new name in the box. Users should never really have to worry about saving. Google Docs does a good job of keeping documents saved without any need for user intervention.
- JulianMorrison 18y ago
  A box with a name would be good, but you miss one important function of saving I took pains to preserve: it is the action which turns tentative changes to the file into permanent ones. You want to preserve those tentative changes, but you don't want to put them in the actual file until the user commands it.
  - smokinn 18y ago
    True, with current software you don't want to save tentative changes but the only reason for that is that your "undo" history is lost the instant you close a program. If you could undo changes through the entire history of the document explicitly saving becomes pointless.

ganley 18y ago

Amen. And iTunes is a total nightmare if you don't want it to store the files where it wants to. I'm all for abstracting away the file system, but the fact remains that there are files under there, so don't make it difficult for me to deal at that level when I have to.

GHFigs 18y ago
I wouldn't call unchecking one preference a "total nightmare".
- spiralhead 18y ago
  However, Mr. Figs, and this is speaking from personal experience, if you happen to store your files on an external USB drive, and you happen to launch itunes at a moment when the drive is disconnected from your laptop, Itunes will revert to its default folder--forcing me to think about things I shouldn't be polluting my brain with.
  - derefr 18y ago
    I actually find that handy for use with my laptop--unplug the HD, import my "core library" (about 30GB), then plug it in and import the rest (over 200GB at this point.) Thus, when I'm out and want to listen to something, I still have all my favorite songs; just not everything (which wouldn't fit on my laptop's HD, anyway.) Basically, it turns the internal HD into a not-too-smart cache of the external one. (On that note, if there's a program that provides this internal/external storage caching mechanism more intelligently and on a larger scale, I'dclove to hear about it.)
- randallsquared 18y ago
  If you're not expecting that, and have mostly empty or invalid ID3 information, because you have habitually kept metadata in the filename and directory hierarchy, iTunes will destroy your library. Everything becomes Unknown Title 243 by Unknown Artist 14, and by the time you notice (because who's expecting an MP3 player to rearrange all the files on disk!?), the only way to fix this is by listening to each track and trying to figure out via Google what song it is. This happened to me in 2003 when I switched from Linux to Mac. I still get a little worked up over that, even though nowadays I just let iTunes manage everything and throw away the original files after I rip something.

d0mine 18y ago

Most people don't understand hierarchical filesystems. It might not be the best way to organize most files, but people do understand hierarchical systems. There are too many examples of hierarchies in everyday life.