[openbeos] Re: B_USER_DATA_DIRECTORY?

From memory (GE site not routing from here), this RFC was inane and
showed no comprehension of what BeOS is. I know GE isn't BeOS, but
moving to a weird Linux-like file system layout is a terrible step
backwards

Cian


On Wed, 29 Sep 2004 23:01:48 +0200 CEST, Jonas Sundström
<jonas@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> "Axel Dörfler" <axeld@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>  ...
> > > You should definitely look at http://glasselevator.sf.net. ;)
> >
> > Okay, I've read it now, and I must disagree
> > with it almost in its entirety :)
>  ...
> > the RFC in this form is useless and will never
> > be accepted.
> 
> (for reference)
> http://glasselevator.sourceforge.net/
> cgi-bin//display_rfc.cgi?show=0003
> 
> Yeah, that proposal shows a lack of understanding
> of the BeOS design and why it's a good thing.
> 
> Replacing the virtual root with a mounted root
> is a step backwards.
> 
> The desktop is the GUI equivalent of the CLI root
> known as "/". Tracker simply hides the root folders
> that are mainly there to allow Unix/Posix apps
> to run without too much re-writing.
> 
> The CLI shows your BeOS partition as /boot
> just above "/", in the same way Tracker displays
> your Boot volume directly on top of your desktop.
> Same thing.
> 
> Perhaps in the future we won't need (to think about)
> partitions, but in the present, and as long as we want
> to dual-boot we have to live with partitions, and the
> BeOS way of presenting partitions,
> (in both the CLI as well as in the GUI env),
> is more noobfriendly than the conglomeration
> technique used by, for example, Linux.
> 
> (FWIW, the virtual root does not preclude the
> mounting of additional partitions as subfolders
> anywhere in the tree - as is common in the Unixes,
> for when you need or want to give parts of the
> fs tree separate quotas, access permissions,
> I/O characteristics, etc.)
> 
> Unix also has the problem that you would want to
> hide as much as possible from the user (in order to
> be userfriendly), while still showing everything to
> applications, without the applications themselves
> revealing the smoke and mirrors. A common API
> like Gnome or KDE could do this, but with Unix
> desktop GUI APIs being so fragemented
> you're bound to get a mixed user experience.
> 
> In BeOS, applications use the Open/Save -panels
> of the BeOS API, in league with Tracker,
> and indeed implemented in libtracker.so, so all
> apps show the BeOS world the way Tracker does,
> whereas ported Unix applications sometimes
> trip up and display the root and places like /tmp,
> which aren't meaningful to most users most of the time.
> 
> Anyway.
> 
> 
> 
> /Jonas Sundström.           www.kirilla.com
> 
>

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