I teach math to undergrads, and damn it’s sad. They don’t know how to send a PDF file from their phone to laptop, and upload it to Canvas. One guy ended up emailing it to me. They don’t even know what a folder/directory is.
Why would they need to know what a folder/directory is? It’s a remnant from meat space and was replaced by tagging and is being replaced by LLM search/AI.
Why wouldn’t they be able to upload it directly to canvas?
I really empathize with people that didn’t have to figure out how to rip a CD at 2x speed or take a class on card catalog systems. They skipped a lot of critical problem solving learning opportunities.
The directory remark is unrelated to the Canvas one. I guess they didn’t have the app set up on the phone in that case.
Anyway, have directories been replaced? I’m having a hard time remembering any filesystem without directories. And we don’t need to put AI in every fucking thing.
I actually use tags as directories in GMail. I can’t find shit otherwise. (Tangent: just how shitty is the search in Outlook? I can never find anything unless labeled in advance.)
I agree for the apps. But then they shouldn’t deal with files anyway. They should just access certain directories as permitted by the system, and those should also be exposed to the user.
Hard disagree on the documents (or anything else, really). One ends up emulating folders using tags anyway, and there’s no real way of doing it in a platform-independent way. Also, searching can be very annoying in many cases. For my research, I end up working with the same files for a few weeks straight. It’s much better if they’re in a folder, rather than searching them every time.
Google docs doesn’t really use folders, and neither does o365. Especially when in a mobile device. Sure you can use folders but it’s limiting compared to tags.
Directory hierarchies are absolutely not a remnant from meatspace. The world “folder” is, but IRL folders are a totally different beast because they’re not nestable. Tags and searching serve useful purposes but they don’t replace directory trees.
The problem with virtual folders is you can’t have one document in multiple folders without causing chaos because of how limiting that hierarchy is. This is why tagging is better.
Location is irrelevant and a legacy method of thought. Why would a digital file need to be held down to a single location? Sure, you could symlink it but that’s a crutch.
Yeah I grok it I just have no idea how you are going to solve all the issues this involves. Like memory mapped I/O or air gapped networks where the file is in a physical location etc. it feels like you will just have to reinvent directory structure inside tags.
Dunno know, maybe make your own *nix that works this way and try to get attention to it.
Managing digital information today is a horrible mess of silos and big business driven incompatibilities. It often drives people to use PDFs, as there is nothing appropriate.
Blame the software/businesses, not the victims/users.
My dream is the (earlier pre 2020s) openness of Android combined with the cohesion and design of Apple.
Android truly is a magnificent clusterfuck like Windows but I still prefer that over someone like Apple defining where I can go and where not.
For Android what is my main draw is that I can fuck around in the filesystem with apps like mixplorer and sideload apps at my own risk. The first part (this is all from the very limited time I had to fiddle with phones from clients) is impossible and the second has too many string attached as far as I am aware.
Oh and I obviously spend money on some apps I would need to find replacements for and most likely pay again. The other points would need to be a strong contender to make me move entirely.
Best of both worlds is a jailbroken iPhone, but it’s becoming nigh impossible these days. Sure, if you have an older phone it’s still possible with some caveats, but long gone are the days of a new model being jailbroken in a year, never mind a week.
I teach math to undergrads, and damn it’s sad. They don’t know how to send a PDF file from their phone to laptop, and upload it to Canvas. One guy ended up emailing it to me. They don’t even know what a folder/directory is.
Why would they need to know what a folder/directory is? It’s a remnant from meat space and was replaced by tagging and is being replaced by LLM search/AI.
Why wouldn’t they be able to upload it directly to canvas?
I really empathize with people that didn’t have to figure out how to rip a CD at 2x speed or take a class on card catalog systems. They skipped a lot of critical problem solving learning opportunities.
The directory remark is unrelated to the Canvas one. I guess they didn’t have the app set up on the phone in that case.
Anyway, have directories been replaced? I’m having a hard time remembering any filesystem without directories. And we don’t need to put AI in every fucking thing.
Gmail was the first to get mainstream support for a directory-less method of organizing.
Music, photo, video apps have no need for directories. Many phone apps have no need in general.
Even your documents folders. It’s easier for me to use search than to drill down through folders.
I actually use tags as directories in GMail. I can’t find shit otherwise. (Tangent: just how shitty is the search in Outlook? I can never find anything unless labeled in advance.)
I agree for the apps. But then they shouldn’t deal with files anyway. They should just access certain directories as permitted by the system, and those should also be exposed to the user.
Hard disagree on the documents (or anything else, really). One ends up emulating folders using tags anyway, and there’s no real way of doing it in a platform-independent way. Also, searching can be very annoying in many cases. For my research, I end up working with the same files for a few weeks straight. It’s much better if they’re in a folder, rather than searching them every time.
You do you, though.
Google docs doesn’t really use folders, and neither does o365. Especially when in a mobile device. Sure you can use folders but it’s limiting compared to tags.
Directory hierarchies are absolutely not a remnant from meatspace. The world “folder” is, but IRL folders are a totally different beast because they’re not nestable. Tags and searching serve useful purposes but they don’t replace directory trees.
Folders are absolutely nestable.
The problem with virtual folders is you can’t have one document in multiple folders without causing chaos because of how limiting that hierarchy is. This is why tagging is better.
How does tagging deal with file locations and permissions?
Location is irrelevant and a legacy method of thought. Why would a digital file need to be held down to a single location? Sure, you could symlink it but that’s a crutch.
Tags can have permissions.
It’s all metadata.
Yeah I grok it I just have no idea how you are going to solve all the issues this involves. Like memory mapped I/O or air gapped networks where the file is in a physical location etc. it feels like you will just have to reinvent directory structure inside tags.
Dunno know, maybe make your own *nix that works this way and try to get attention to it.
Tell me you’ve never used a filing cabinet…
Managing digital information today is a horrible mess of silos and big business driven incompatibilities. It often drives people to use PDFs, as there is nothing appropriate. Blame the software/businesses, not the victims/users.
I mostly agree with you. But it only works because users give in. They deserve some of the blame.
Honestly I use discord or email for that >.>
Windows/iPhone doesn’t seem to have a great solution as far as I’ve checked.
The recent integration Apple did in their newest update is peak usability.
Sadly it’s locked in the ecosystem.
Dude, I love Apple hardware for phones but their locked in ecosystem and to an extent the OS is so fucking annoying.
My dream is the (earlier pre 2020s) openness of Android combined with the cohesion and design of Apple.
Android truly is a magnificent clusterfuck like Windows but I still prefer that over someone like Apple defining where I can go and where not.
For Android what is my main draw is that I can fuck around in the filesystem with apps like mixplorer and sideload apps at my own risk. The first part (this is all from the very limited time I had to fiddle with phones from clients) is impossible and the second has too many string attached as far as I am aware.
Oh and I obviously spend money on some apps I would need to find replacements for and most likely pay again. The other points would need to be a strong contender to make me move entirely.
But it’s very tempting.
Best of both worlds is a jailbroken iPhone, but it’s becoming nigh impossible these days. Sure, if you have an older phone it’s still possible with some caveats, but long gone are the days of a new model being jailbroken in a year, never mind a week.