Lockal 5 days ago

  /usr -> Program Files (hello spaces my old friends, you've come to break my apps again)
  /var -> ProgramData (but no spaces here)
  /home -> Documents and Settings
  /etc -> Control Panel
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  • codedokode 4 days ago

    Spaces break things only in Lnux; Mac and Windows support them since beginning. Why should we write without spaces as if we were in 5th century?

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    • jadamson 4 days ago

      Spaces are avoided on base Linux systems because they're clunky for terminals more than fear of outright breaking things. To the extent spaces there do break things, that also happens on Mac and Windows for the same reasons (hence ProgramData being conspicuously space-less).

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csvm 5 days ago

What is the point of this? What is this adding to the conversation?

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  • jadamson 5 days ago

    What I took out of it is that we are human, and humans use abbreviations to save time and effort, not because printer ink was expensive in the '70s.

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    • oblio 4 days ago

      The abbreviations I wrote are unambiguous. When I first learned about Unix, I basically guessed - I assume as most first timers do - that the folder is basically the location of miscellaneous files ("et caetera").

      Oh, let alone the fact that a bunch of the abbreviations are utterly non-intuitive to first timers.

      /bin - binaries - nobody born after circa 1980 calls them that anymore. Executables, applications, apps, etc.

      /boot - from a lame Baron Munchausen joke from 1970. Should probably be /startup.

      /dev - dev is SUPER commonly used for "development". Easy enough to solve as /devices.

      /home - okish, probably one of the best named that are actually in there. I'm shocked it's not /ho or /hm.

      /lib - reasonable. Though these days in the US it might trigger political feelings :-p

      /media - new and reasonable.

      /mnt - the whole metaphor of "mounting" is... debatable.https://www.neowin.net/forum/topic/144012-unix-sex/

      /opt - what does this even do? Optional? Optional WHAT? Absolutely 0 semantic info provided by the name.

      Anyway, a lot of people have done this criticism better than me and it's boring at this point.

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      • jadamson 4 days ago

        > The abbreviations I wrote are unambiguous. When I first learned about Unix, I basically guessed

        They're completely ambiguous to someone who doesn't speak English.

        > /mnt - the whole metaphor of "mounting" is... debatable

        What? Have you never heard of mounting a picture on a wall? Mounting an engine? That's the metaphor.

        > Anyway, a lot of people have done this criticism better than me and it's boring at this point.

        Your original complaint was about "src", suggesting calling it "source", which is still ambiguous by your own standard. Source of what? How is someone going to know what "source" means if they've never heard of booting a computer? Who is the audience for this change?

        Some of your suggestions aren't meritless, but your jumping-off point certainly was.

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        • oblio 4 days ago

          > They're completely ambiguous to someone who doesn't speak English.

          The baseline is English and that's life. I'm not a native English speaker.

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