Re: Deactivating the Trash

[Matthew Thomas <mpt myrealbox com>]

On 9 Sep, 2005, at 10:18 AM, Luca Ferretti wrote:
> ...
> Note that deletion_time is not the only "metadata" to monitor. A smart
> trash algorithm should be able to figure that a 3M MPEG movie is less
> important than a 3M Gnumeric spreasheet, 'couse MBs are typical size of
> videos, while only a spreadsheed with a lot (and maybe important) data
> can reach MBs.
> ...
>         <b><big>Confirm deletion of maybe important items?</b><big>
>
>         You are going to delete some items that could be important for
>         you. This message appears when the items were previously marked
>         with the "Important" emblem or are bigger then the typical 
> sizes
>         of their file types (you made a big effort to produce them).
>         Please confirm their deletion, activating the checkbox.
>         
> -------------------------------------------------------------------
>         [*] file1.doc (1,5 MB)
>         [*] team.sxi  (8,1 MB)        
> -------------------------------------------------------------------
>
>                         [ Delete All ]  [ Cancel ]  [ Delete Selected ]
> ...

I think that's a pretty good demonstration of why this wouldn't work. 
It's far too complicated for a confirmation alert, and it would be 
popping up at seemingly-random times, which would be very annoying.

Anyway, confirmation alerts are for programs with insufficient undo. 
The whole point of the Trash is to provide undo for throwing stuff 
away. So putting up an alert for automatic deletion would be snatching 
defeat from the jaws of victory.

--
Matthew Paul Thomas
http://mpt.net.nz/