Cleaning up $HOME [was: Re: .hidden files? what dos that mean? ]

[Ryan McDougall <ryan mcdougall telusplanet net>]

On Tue, 2003-07-01 at 13:40, James Willcox wrote:
> Jens,
> 
> On Tue, 2003-07-01 at 14:25, Jens Ansorg wrote:
> > hi,
> > 
> > just emerged the latest version of Nautilus (on Gentoo).
> > the News tell me
> > 
> > This is nautilus 2.3.6. The file manager for the Gnome 2 desktop.
> > 
> > Major changes since 2.3.5 are:
> > 
> > * .hidden file support
> > 
> > 
> > I went through the list archive but could not find anyting about this
> > .hidden stuff.
> > What is this about?
> 
> It's totally sweet.  You can create a file called ".hidden" in any
> directory, and in it list files that you don't want nautilus to show. 
> For instance, my ~/.hidden contains "evolution" which causes nautilus to
> not show ~/evolution.
> 
> James

I consider this to be a hack. The real problem is with how applications
(ab)use the home directory. When I do a 'ls -al' on my home directory I
get a screen full of hidden files I should never edit, half of which I
ran once and have never used since, and half a screen of non hidden
files that should be hidden, such as ~/evolution. ( Although its getting
a little better ).

The correct solution is a Freedesktop.org or LSB standard that enforces
some sort of order on the current mess in most peoples home directories:

~/.etc for all those annoying config files, like .emacs, that one
shouldnt have to mess with.

~/.tmp for all those annoying temorary/session/errordump files that
often get left lying about.

~/.usr or ~/.data for the large data that some apps generate, such as
evotion's mail database.

As for ~/evolution, this folder is basically not useful via Nautilus so
it shouldnt be visible ( as .hidden lets you do ), but the solution is
not a .hidden file, but to get Ximain, and all the other app makers to
clean up their stuff.

This goes for gnome too, which has such repeat offenders as .gnome,
.gnome2, .gnome_private, .gnome2_private, .gnome-desktop, .gconf,
.gconfd, .nautilus, .recently-used, .Trash, .gtkrc, .gtkrc-1.2-gnome,
.gtk-kde, etc...

If you were annoyed just to read that list imagine the nightmare a
novice user might have! Do *you* know what half of your hidden files do?
I dont. ;)

If you plan to argue that hidden files are just that, supposedly hidden,
then what is one suppsed to do when one has to modify one of these
files, or otherwise needs to view the hidden files, and must necessarily
wade through the quagmire that looks almost as bad a the windows
registry? Regardless of whether you agree with me that it is a problem,
you must agree that the current situation is a mess, and could really
use a cleanup.

All Gnome apps should make use of GConf where possible, and the rest
should be put into some sort of organization, for example:

$HOME
	.etc
		gnome
			gconf
			gnome-desktop
			gtk
			...
	.usr
		evolution
		openoffice
		emacs
		adobe
		gftp
		galeon
		gimp
		gphoto
		gnucash
		...
	.tmp
		fonts.cache
		plugin141_01.trace
		rhn-applet.cache
		.jpi_cache
		...

Thoughts? Ive been meaning to bring this up with Freedesktop.org or
Havoc, so I hope he lurking here today.

Cheers,
Ryan