Re: [Summary] Meta-data/filesystem-encapsulation

[John R Sheets <dusk smsi-roman com>]

David Jeske wrote:
> 

Sounds good to me!  I'm beginning to like the Next system.  Just
have one question/concern right now:

> 3) by requiring apps to use relative paths to get to their components,
>    we allow administrators to have control over where apps are installed.
>    In addition to other issues, this allows things like:
>     - user installing apps in their own directories
>     - multiple versions of the same app
>     - pre-compiled binaries to be installed anywhere

How does this work with multiple users?  If you keep all your
type info in the same directory as the executable, how can you
change the configuration between users?  You'd pretty much have
to put each user's personal settings in separate subdirectories
of the main encapsulated directory.  That doesn't sound like a
good way to go.

Either that, or split the configs up.  The system defaults would
appear in the app's atomic directory, and if a user wanted to
override something, they would put something in their
~/.gnome/<whatever> directory.  Right?  But then you no longer
get the "move it and it just works" thing, because you'd have to
worry about what's in the user's home directory, too.

How does NeXT handle this part?

John