Comment by sli

Comment by sli 2 days ago

9 replies

All of those are optional restrictions, not mandatory. On Windows, it's (practically) mandatory.

Maybe some Windows wizards could get around the mandatory restrictions, but an average Linux user can get around the optional ones.

rusk 2 days ago

Streaming as defacto metaphor for file access goes back to tape drives. Random Access patterns make more sense with today’s media yet we’re all still fscanf-ing

Of course there are alternatives but the resource-as-stream metaphor is so ubiquitous in Unix, it’s hard to avoid.

GoblinSlayer 2 days ago

Drive letters are just /mnt, you can get around that, even with GUI.

  • darkwater 2 days ago

    So why a default Windows install still uses and shows C:?

    • GoblinSlayer 2 days ago

      Because A is reserved for floppy drive, and B - for zip drive.

      • darkwater a day ago

        No, A: and B: were for floppies, when having 2 floppy readers was the norm.

        But anyway ignoring the sarcasm my question was implying: if this is totally customizable in Windows, why Microsoft still ships C: (or whatever other letter) as the default name for the first user partition? Show it to legacy programs with hardcoded values to maintain compatibility, but at least in Explorer and MS controlled software, use some more modern/legible name.

      • dragonwriter 2 days ago

        A: and B: were both for floppies, dual floppy systems were around and common, both with and without hard disks, long before Zip disks existed, and Zip disks came around far too late (1994!) to influence the MS-DOS naming standard.

      • otterley 2 days ago

        Drive B was always a floppy disk drive.

        Zip disks presented themselves with drive letters higher than B (usually D: assuming you had a single hard disk). However, some (all?) Zip drives could also accept legacy 3.5" floppies, and those would show up as B.