Daniel Hruska Storing files in folders has been part of computers for decades. Nothing has changed in this way to this day. Well, at least on desktop systems. iOS has almost eradicated the concept of folders, only allowing them to be created at one level. Will Apple resort to this move on its computers in the future? About this option on your own blog wrote Oliver Reichenstein, a member of the iA Writer pro team iOS a OS X.
Folder folder folder folder folder…
The folder system is a geek invention. They invented it in the early years of computers, because how else would you want to organize your files than in your kennels? In addition, the directory structure allows for a theoretically unlimited number of nestings, so why not take advantage of this feature. However, the tree structure of the components is not completely natural for the human brain, which of course is not able to remember all items in individual levels. If you doubt this, list the individual items from the menu bar of your browser.
However, components can be dug much deeper. Once a hierarchical structure grows by more than one level, the average brain ceases to have an idea of its form. In addition to poor navigation, the folder system tends to create a cluttered impression. Users don't want to carefully sort their data for convenient access. They want things to simply work. Again, you can think about yourself, how well you have sorted your music, movies, books, study materials and other files. What about the area? Do you also have a pile of hard-to-sort documents on it?
Then you are probably a normal computer user. Sorting into folders really takes patience, and maybe one needs a little less laziness. Unfortunately, the problem occurs even after creating a kind of repository of your workflow and multimedia content. You have to maintain it all the time or you will end up with dozens to hundreds of files on your desktop or in your downloads folder. Their one-time move will already be forced due to the already established folder system... simply "unfortunate".
However, Apple has already solved the problem of collecting thousands of files in one pile. Where? Well, in iTunes. You certainly don't scroll through your endless music library from top to bottom just to find the song you want. No, you simply start writing the initial letter of that artist. Or use the spotlight in the upper right corner of the iTunes window to filter content.
For the second time, the people from Cupertino managed to neutralize the problem of immersion and increasing lack of transparency in iOS. It does contain a directory structure, but it is completely hidden from users. Files can only be accessed through applications that also save these files at the same time. Although this is a simple method, it has one major drawback - duplication. Whenever you try to open a file in another application, it is immediately copied. Two identical files will be created, occupying double the memory capacity. To do this, you need to remember in which application the most current version is stored. I'm not even talking about exporting to a PC and then importing back to an iOS device. How to get out of it? Establish an intermediary.
iCloud
Apple Cloud became part of iOS 5 and now also OS X Mountain Lion. In addition to the e-mail box, synchronization of calendars, contacts and iWork documents, searching for your devices through Web interface iCloud offers more. Applications distributed via the Mac App Store and the App Store can implement file synchronization via iCloud. And it doesn't have to be just files. For example, the well-known game Tiny Wings has been able to transfer game profiles and game progress between multiple devices thanks to iCloud since its second version.
But back to the files. As said before, apps from the Mac App Store have iCloud access privilege. Apple calls this feature Documents in iCloud. When you open a Documents-enabled app in iCloud, an opening window appears with two panels. The first one shows all the files of the given application stored in iCloud. In the second panel On My Mac classically you look for the file in the directory structure of your Mac, there is nothing new or interesting about this.
However, what I am excited about is the ability to save to iCloud. No more components, at least on multiple levels. Like iOS, iCloud storage allows you to create folders at only one level. Surprisingly, this is more than enough for certain applications. Some files belong together more than others, so there is no harm in grouping them into one folder. The rest can simply remain at the zero level, even if it should consist of several thousand files. Multiple nesting and tree traversal is slow and inefficient. In larger files, the box in the upper right corner can be used for faster searching.
Even though I'm a bit of a geek at heart, most of the time I use my Apple devices like a regular user. Since I own three, I've always looked for the most convenient way to share smaller documents online, typically text files or PDFs. Like most, I opted for Dropbox, but I still haven't been 100% satisfied using it, especially when it comes to files that I only open in one single application. For example for .md or .txt I use iA Writer exclusively, so synchronizing the desktop and mobile versions via iCloud is an absolutely ideal solution for me.
Sure, iCloud in a single app isn't a panacea. For now, none of us can do without a universal storage that you can access from different devices running on different platforms. Second, Documents in iCloud still only really makes sense if you use the same app on iOS and OS X. And third, iCloud isn't perfect yet. So far, its reliability is around 99,9%, which is of course a nice number, but in terms of the total number of users, the remaining 0,01% would make a regional capital.
Future
Apple is slowly revealing to us the path it wants to take. So far, the Finder and the classic file system have nothing to worry about, as users have been used to it for years. However, the market for so-called post-PC devices is experiencing a boom, people are buying iPhones and iPads in incredible volumes. They then logically spend a lot of time on these devices, whether it is playing games, browsing the web, handling mail or working. iOS devices are very simple to use. It's all about the apps and the content in them.
OS X is rather the opposite. We also work in applications, but we have to insert content into them using files that are stored, wow, in folders. In Mountain Lion, Documents in iCloud were added, but Apple certainly does not force users to use them. Rather, it just indicates that we should count on this feature in the future. The question remains, what will the file system look like in ten years? Should the Finder as we know it be shaking at the knees?
I would appreciate something like categories much more than directories. All the files would be in one place, but they could be assigned to multiple categories. So everything we now call directories could be transformed into dynamic folders. This system would solve the problem that everyone who tries to keep their directory structure in order - a file that doesn't belong anywhere, or worse, everywhere... ;) I hope it will come in a year.
But this again assumes that the user will sort and categorize. So same problem as folders.
"All the files would be in one place, but they could be assigned multiple categories."
You can do that today too. Since there have been so-called "lines" in filesystems, and they have existed for many decades, you can easily arrange it this way.
Lines exist in all common operating systems:
http://cs.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pevn%C3%BD_odkaz
There is nothing stopping you - and for many years - from organizing your files this way. You can do it on Mac, Unix and Windows.
You don't have to wait for anything. You've had it for a long time.
Miloslav Ponkrác
I don't know, I personally can't imagine life without address books, since I write hundreds of documents and often need to sort them, so iCloud seems to me the same as having them somewhere in the finder, they're just in the cloud, but of course I prefer to search using spotlight, but still categorization is fine even if it takes time
And how to store e.g. photos in this "structure"? Something along the lines of: "Her vacation photo, well, here's another one, but it's already from the construction of the pool, gee, another vacation photo and here we have a dog?
There are folders up to the 1st level.
Photos/Vacation/ and keep uploading here... this is more like uploading to people who are messy and the ability to search again assumes that I have everything correctly labeled and named and not just DSC1234.jpg
as a professional photographer, I work with a simple system for archiving photos. name the processed photos 2012 (year taken) DOV (first three letters - permission is needed here) and put 0801 for the month and day taken and finally before the ending .jpg or raw. serial number from 001 to 999. so the last photo from vacation looks like 2012DOV0801001.jpg I have been using this system for several years and it has always worked for me :-)
Sir, you must be a big Matrix fan, huh? :-)
There's only one thing to say about that: who among the millions of "young people" who have been taught by iOS not to solve anything, it just happened somehow, will do this?
yes, that's exactly the reason why I don't use iPhoto on my mac, but picassa. file system 1:1, you just have to remember that when you delete a photo folder, you are working with the data directly on the disk in the structure.
What about iPhoto? There is no folder system. Just one big database
filesystem built on some kind of labeling, I would also appreciate most of the content is temporary with me and I don't have the desire or time to sort through them all the time
That's probably one of the good ways. In itunes, it's sorted according to metadata, artist, album, ... Here it's written in a file. But to be able to mark each file with a label and then somehow search it according to the label, why not. That's how gmail does it with mail and it's cool.
Especially when I want to have it in several places, a problem. I have copies. And the resulting inconsistency (I don't care if there is a lot of unnecessary data, I won't write 100 GB of text in my entire life). Sure, symlink, and I'll explain to whom and how?
I have it all sorted, I don't see anything annoying or complicated about it. I have absolutely nothing on my desktop, a few applications in the dock that I use often, movies in movies, photos in photos, music only in the itunes library, apps in apps. documents, a folder for school and one folder for things that don't belong anywhere or everywhere.
There are at least two of us - I feel exactly the same way! ;-)
Jesus, I'm sorry. Inadvertently (and stupid reading) I knocked you something I didn't want at all. Instead of a thumbs up, I knocked off the flag. And now I don't know how to cancel it.
I just wanted to say that I have the same problem
detto..in the dock I have all the applications I use, on the desktop 2 folders with school and work, while in the school folder I have everything beautifully sorted into folders and subfolders with semester, year, subject, lecture, etc. (in other words, beautifully laid out so that I can immediately could step into the folder I need), movies in movies, photos, documentaries, music detto..
and that's how I like it.. that way I know what exactly it is, and since I have a good enough memory, when I need to retrieve a document, I immediately know where I have it stored and I can manipulate it right away
This solution seems very unnecessary to me. If a person is a brothel, then the best system will not help him. I basically have my music sorted in Music/interpret/album/song.mp3 – for this, it is enough to run an application once a month that organizes files according to ID3 tags. I have the series again Movies/Serials/Doctor Who/1. series/1. dil – bla.avi. And not to mention the programming that I have in Developing/name-git-repozitare/... If I need a file in several places at the same time and for it to be always up-to-date, then ln -sa sshfs is ideal for this
already working with finder is horrible! there are variants, but unfortunately they are not linked to the internal structure, viz. sidebar etc. cancellation of folders when developers, graphic designers and other professionals need access is really a total recall...
This already works, so it's just a matter of taking away someone's ability to keep their files in order.
I'm here to clean up my computer - I recently started doing this, I put the folder with all my stuff directly on the disk (so it's not on the desktop), the shortcut to the dock, and deleted/moved everything else from the desktop. The result is a completely empty desktop, and several folders in the dock. I'm fine with it, but sometimes it's slow.
Otherwise, regarding the architecture itself - I totally agree that the more levels/nesting, the more chaos. Unfortunately, there is probably no reason to solve it yet, I solve it with the most concise folder name and careful sorting, so that when looking for something, I don't have to remember where I could have saved it, but could go by the labels.
Well, this article is really off. The fact that the ability to see folders is hidden from users on iOS does not mean that it is the end of them. Internally, the rear system is probably difficult to get by without folders. On the other hand, that folder is also just a file. It's just a pointer. But that's probably for another conversation.
If I go back to the original thought in the article, how would you solve the situation when it is necessary to have several files with the same name but different content?
I think we can go back to earth and think something about summer heat and cucumbers.
After all, the article doesn't talk about files disappearing at the filesystem level. The user would see the documents (photos, videos, texts, projects…), but in the background it would be a complex directory structure. I also can't see the files in iPhoto, does that mean they aren't there?
So I don't see, but the title of the article is: DOES MOUNTAIN LION SIGNIFY THE END OF CLASSIC COMPONENTS IN THE FILE SYSTEM?
And also the whole article meanders in this sense. So I don't think I'm getting it wrong.
The end means the end for the user. The truth is that the title is not too happily chosen. This topic is talked about from time to time and always means cutting off users from the filesystem.
if they do it, it's only to lock their users in apple products
there is no other reason, it will end up like picassa on windows, as soon as there is a mess...
Just now sometimes I was a little interested in it and then fell out of reality. When I came to the MacBook and started creating a presentation, after which it asked me where to save it... at that moment I thought to myself "so save it somewhere, no, I don't really care where it is, the main thing is that I can see it the next time I open Keynote, what would I do?" he's probably done with it elsewhere" and the same applies for example to movies, music, series (where it is therefore resolved as part of the purchase in the iTunes Store, where the physical file can be completely stolen from you, especially if it is), the same iPhoto, just think a little and you always come up with some apt name of the Event, which, in combination with the thumbnail and the date, will help you when looking back for photos.
For working with more complex files, the unification in the given app is definitely great, and there are definitely more people who would appreciate it (though perhaps unknowingly) than those who would be bothered/restricted by it. But when I'm talking about the presentation, there were probably greater demands on performance if I downloaded images from the Internet and imported them directly into iPhoto or perhaps the extended Preview and then pushed them into Keynote, where the "broke" Downloads folder still leads.
Another option, and I think it would work best and probably suit me the most, is that the Finder would work within applications, that is, it would unify the application libraries. So, in the Sidebar, music would represent the iTunes library, Photos the iPhoto library, documents, the iWork library, etc. If I now want to add someone's face to Contacts, then the added libraries in the Sidebar Finder connected to iPhoto, where I can crawl up to Faces, are absolutely divine.
You're a joke :-) Save it somewhere? :-))) Anyone who uses a computer for work and not for play would wonder in a few years. Imagine a graphic designer who has 50 clients, each of them advertising in several magazines in different sizes. Those advertisements are composed of vector and bitmap data and completed in a third program. This means thousands of different ads over a few years in different applications. And clients don't only have advertisements :-) In short, the depth of the folder structure depends on the complexity of the project. And that I would remember the search names for maybe 5 years? :-)
In my opinion, iPhoto is a beautiful example, where you can quickly find everything even 10 years old using tags, data, etc. And if you have a final program where you complete everything, in a simplified view (I don't know what you use), why couldn't he have the whole project under his thumb.
At least I assume that if you go looking for something 5 years ago, you know what you're looking for and also when you worked on it, otherwise I don't really understand it - on this assumption you'll spotlight in the project library of the final program: Advertisement, Novák, 2008 or add a tag Pink. I also can't estimate how often you look back a few years in your projects, i.e. if it would be worthwhile for you. Anyway, iCloud already shows that you just name it and it drops it somewhere. In any case, I still believe that the classic foldering in Macintosh HD and User will ring as soon as possible, after all, they are not like Microsoft, they are hindered by people's reluctance, incompetence and fear, and when they come up with something "revolutionary", it's such crap as Metro on PC.
This is not to say that 5 levels of nested folders are not better for you -> not for me, so I am looking for a solution that would suit my temporary work. And one more thing, I think that a "dual" mode could also be real, where the same folder structure would be created for you according to some data that I spotlighted above, so everyone would have their own. However, I assume that one person will not be in charge of such an intervention in the system, so whatever my inventions are, they certainly won't solve it. Full speed ahead
Complete agreement. I have many projects for many customers and I can imagine a system based on iTunes or iPhoto. There is no reason to have resources sorted in folders. I produced, for example, a catalog of office supplies in InDesign with approx. 7000 resources on several disks, and to think that a person can maintain order in it, which he could rely on 100%, in the folders is illusory. You end up packing it all in one place anyway and backing it up. The file system as we know it today is an anachronism that bothers me.
There you go. And it's the same with working - not playing - on music or video, as it is with DTP. And what about data recycling, i.e. using the same resources for several projects.
The problem will be more that I won't know which application I have the file in... I use multiple applications for photos, documents...
Um. And what about projects that involve multiple types of data?
I am a designer and as part of the project I need drawings, 3D input data, output data - created, sometimes animation and music... Etc
So in this case the folders are priceless. That is, if I don't approach the neck breaker named. However, the idea of an integrated project manager as a superstructure on top of filesystems is quite tempting
It doesn't matter if all the data is in one folder or more. Just sort the data by type (in Windows) and it's also clear. I use both ways and it's just a matter of habit.
A person who has never worked seriously with a computer can declare that the folders are fine only up to the first level. Replacing/supplementing the system with tagging is definitely an interesting idea, existing for a long time regardless of Apple. Instead of /work/this experiment/data/date and /work/this experiment/method 1/parameters 1, one would look for the tags work, this experiment, date, method, parameters... Folders are actually such tagging from top to bottom, soft links ( to a limited extent) tag across the structure. The sandbox, as hyper-secure as it is, drinks my blood practically every time I try a workflow on iOS, although Apple won't admit it, there is no such thing as an application that can do everything on the given input data.. And one more note, both iOS and Mountain Lion level folders (filesystem) exist unchanged.
hmmm this could be interesting!
It has happened to me several times that I had one file in different directories just because it simply belonged there methodically. This way it could exist only once and the tag would refer to it.
I can totally see how it would then be possible to automatically generate "mind maps" based on the context of the data.
or at all: a mind map as a file system!
How about using (hard|sym)links? You're ready for it. And OS X (or HFS+) knows them too.
Ah, well, when Apple cancels folders, we will have to program applications (even for OS X) on a completely different OS, because I really can't imagine how it could be solved without folders :D
As a dj, I can't imagine finder without folders... for example, I open the house folder and there I have other folders in which I have music according to bpm :D and in those I have other folders and in those others.. :D
100 – 99.9 = 0.01?