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by raxxorraxor 1345 days ago
> The raw filesystem is an antiquated interface

Not really. It has often been tried to find something better, but there really isn't. It works decently on Apple because they set certain constraints and standards. But overall it is like saying a table of contents in books is antiquated. You don't need it for belles lettres, sure. The analogy doesn't fit too well, but there a similarities.

It is actually the most simple way to present structured information. It is not optimal, but decently approaches it. This is a reason why it is so successful and to my experience even normal users don't have too much trouble with it. Alternatives obfuscate this for everyone.

1 comments

A table of contents isn't the same thing as the raw file system, and is much more analogous to the simplified file system available on iPads.
It is an insufficient abstraction because it gives you less power as a user. Same with everything on iOS. This sadly creeps into MacOS too.

If a table of contents it is a good analogy depends on what you define as content. For me the content is all the files.

A generic way to view data content is a file explorer that lets you explore the file system. Some abstractions can be here too, but it shouldn't be too much and certainly not to a degree like iOS. I can understand why it is there, it is a consumer device primarily.

If you have more than 10 documents, how do you organize them by topic? Into a new folder? Thought as much...