[Wylug-discuss] KDE

[Dave Fisher]

On Tue, Jan 03, 2006 at 11:38:02PM +0000, RichardA wrote:
> On Tue, 3 Jan 2006 13:08:27 +0000 (GMT), John Hodrien
> <johnh at comp.leeds.ac.uk> wrote:
> > The zoominess sounds not unpleasant, but I've found konqueror seems
> > really dated compared to nautlius which is very clean (once you've
> > turned off bloody spatial mode).
> 
> Why does everyone hate spatial mode? 

> It's slower than a folder tree for
> complicated operations or deeply nested folders, but ...

I think that you just answered that yourself.

I doubt if I'm alone in having filesystem hierarchies that have
accumulated a great deal of cruft and complexity over the years, i.e.
using a very small number of undivided data folders is not the normal
case for me, and I doubt that it is for many long term unix users.

As often as not, the complexity in my filesystems  is the product of
earlier simplification and tidying efforts, e.g. sud-dividing
directories to reduce the size of the individual informational spaces
I need to manage.

Personally, I'm inclined to suspect that the Gnome usability team's
findings on this topic were artifacts of the test methodology, e.g.
testing on clean installs, with users who hadn't yet had time to
accumulate much cruft. 

I suspect that you'd  get similar results by testing on Windows or Mac
users who have been socialised into using 'My X' folders and search with
application FileOpen dialogues filtering by file extension/type.

Just about the biggest problem I have as a trainer, is coping with
Windows users who have no conception at all of filesystem hierarchies
(hence paths) or of the distinction between applications and data files.

For all the hype about database driven filestems, I suspect that
directory trees will be with us for a while.  In my view people find the
concept of containers and contents (e.g. boxes/drawers and files) that
bit more concrete than string/regexp matching.

Dave