zlacker

On that note. what is with this modern trend of trying to pretend the filesystem does not exist.

why does google(or apple) need "special interfaces" to access the filesystem in a specific way, why don't they just use the existing file api and improve the file access permission system.

I think the unix single tree filesystem was one of their great innovations and see this multi tree api fragmentation bullshit as a sort of backwards regression.

>>somat+(OP)
> what is with this modern trend of trying to pretend the filesystem does not exist.

My cynical read is that the filesystem is user freedom, and the walled gardens don't want user freedom.

>>somat+(OP)
Cynical take: it puts Google Drive on a level playing-field with local storage (by making the local storage experience awful).

>>somat+(OP)
For the overwhelming majority of users, the file system is a confusing implementation detail that often breaks something when they're forced or tricked into directly interacting with it.

>>david_+24
You're nearly correct, actually. In addition to security, SAF was supposed to provide a consistent interface to access files from various sources, including network sources, not just the local filesystem. Unfortunately the implementation just kind of sucks.

>>crooke+Vf
This is not my experience with Windows users. Tree hierarchies are very natural for us humans.

>>NotPra+wk
That sounds right, I would have implemented google drive as a filesystem driver, but I am not google so what do I know.

>>crooke+Vf
My experience is the opposite.

Try asking an elderly user of an Android phone where the attachments from gmail they have tried to save are stored in.

I think they'd cope a lot better with a standard folder/file hierarchy as opposed to saving into a folder/file hierarchy but never at any point telling the user where in the hierarchy they saved to!

And every app saves to a different location. I've been using computers my entire life and I generally have to resort to a file manager to find what I'm looking for.