Re: Virtual Directory Structure

[Mihai BAZON <mbazon websci ro>]

Good question.  And after all discussion, I'd really want to say that
"home" is a nice name, much easier to remember / type than "User
Directories" (or "Documents and Settings" -- whoa, so ugly..).

The organization of the Linux filesystema makes it much more easy to
maintain than e.g. a Windows system, where everyone may store the files
wherever he wants.  It takes little time to get familiar, but has some
advantages, after all.. so why hide it from the user?  If, for any
reason, Nautilus won't start at some point, and the newbie hits "ls /"
in a terminal and sees all that, he will say "Gosh, where are my
files?".  Really, I think you shouldn't hide the original file names.


Cheers,

/*   -*- Mishoo -*-         In the beginning there was nothing,
 *  mishoo websci ro      which exploded.   (The Big Bang Theory)  */

On Sat, 12 May 2001 thristian atdot org wrote:

> On Fri, May 11, 2001 at 02:27:03PM +0200, Guillermo S. Romero / Familia Romero wrote:
>
> <snip description>
>
> > Aventages:
> > - easy names (what really short names mean more or less, IMHO)
> > - translatable (French, German...)
> > - able to use old (or show in mix mode) if desired
> > - not excesively virtual (you can print a guide in a sheet for those
> > cases where it does not work, ie system recovery)
> > - all apps will work, no low level requirements (all GNOME apps should
> > use normal Unix names inside, but show new names if requested)
> > - secure / conservative approach
> > - can be created with some kind of global and user rules like
> > s|/bin/|/Applications/|g or s|^~/mail/|^~/Mail/|
> >
> > Problems:
> > - hides a bit
> > - does use " ", "_" and "/" like old style, so I guess people will
> > tear clothes (I guess they are happy with interfaces that give no
> > clues and do weird things, like some webpages)
> > - new things are not automatically translated, you have to add some
> > config to the system if new dirs appear, until then, a mix appears
> >
> > Comments? Fixes? Direct discard? :]
>
> What happens if one of the "friendly names" exists as a real
> directory? For example, MacOSX's friendly names are actual folders on
> the drive - including "Applications". If you mount a MacOSX drive
> under Linux (It's UFS, after all) there *will* be an Applications/
> folder, *and* a bin/ folder in the same place. To which will the
> virtual "Applications/" refer?
>
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