New at Reason

Tim Cavanaugh | May 3, 2005

Paying the poor, digging through Longhorn droppings, and watching the refcam, in Reason Express.

Comments

|5.3.05 @ 7:26PM|#

I really don't get the file system bit.

Directories and files have been reliable and consistent for the past 20 years.

Sure if you're on the server end you get fun things like RAID, DFS, SAN's, encryption, ACL's, etc, but what does that have to do with a user?

Mike|5.3.05 @ 8:26PM|#

I think by "lost" Microsoft means "I can't find that damn file where did I save it?" not "I saved that file and it just DISAPPEARED!" You are correct that RAID, journaling, general hardware reliability, etc. have solved most of the disappearing files problem, but it has done little to improve the "where did I save it" problem.

Lazlo Nibble|5.3.05 @ 9:07PM|#

I doubt that adding metadata support to the filesystem (a la WinFS) is going to help the problem either. The Office file formats support internal metadata already and that doesn't help the people who can't find stuff (because they always just dump everything onto the Desktop or into My Documents...)

|5.3.05 @ 10:14PM|#

Soccer fanatics in Britain can use Sky TV to dial up their own camera angles, commentators, and even place wagers on the action.
You mean I'll never have to listen to Joe Theisman and Joe Buck ever again? That's worth the price of admission. The interesting side effect is that networks will be able to find out who people choose to listen to and who they ignore and can pay accordingly. I think a lot of the high priced talent that just fawn over players and engage in inane conversation will start to lose out to the #3 and 4 teams that provide more intelligent commentary.

|5.4.05 @ 5:42AM|#

Err, open "find"--search for files of type "Word Documents" first, then all--include word of text that you were looking for.

That'll be $200.

Thanks for using Geeks On Call.

|5.4.05 @ 5:46AM|#

The interesting side effect is that networks will be able to find out who people choose to listen to and who they ignore and can pay accordingly. I think a lot of the high priced talent that just fawn over players and engage in inane conversation will start to lose out to the #3 and 4 teams that provide more intelligent commentary.

That's already happening to some extent with baseball. There were always those who'd turn the tv on with the sound down and play the radio, but given Extra Innings/MLB TV/The Bastards at Comcast, you often end up with a choice, though most agree the MLB TV and other packages aren't always up to par, technically.

|5.4.05 @ 5:53AM|#

I can type up another detailed eplanation of how OS integration of meta-data (think find in OpenFileDialog with auto-gen'd meta-data) would result in eactly what they're saying, but I think my point is clear that the post in reason epress was quite incoherent.

My first post on the subject got lost.

Besides, those who doubt the skill of MS Usability engineers are just digging their own grave in the marketplace. I was floored when I finally read the Elvis User Persona used to target developent of C# and the .net framework. When an aggregate personality is you on nine out of ten points, including the neighborhood you live in, you tend to sit up and take notice.

|5.4.05 @ 9:25AM|#

From the Social Security bit: "Progressive indexing says: Yep, I am cutting benefits, but I'm only going to reduce the benefits of the well-off...Right now busting that cap, a massive marginal tax hike on productive but not exactly wealthy Americans, is still on the table."

So when we're talking about cutting people's benefits, those earning $35,000 a year are "well-off," but when we're talking about the payroll tax, those earning $95,000 a year are "productive but not exactly wealthy."

Gotcha.

|5.4.05 @ 9:27AM|#

There is a lot of misunderstanding with regard to what WinFS is. I will try to be as brief as I can, but it gets a little confusing.
Searching for files will be available in Longhorn, and it will be based on some metadata, filename, type etc., and there will be near instantaneous access to that type of thing - similar, but hopefully better than MSN Toolbar, or Google Desktop search.
WinFS is a metadata/storage schema/engine that is built on top of NTFS, which has an API. Let's look at an example of what should be possible.
When you receive a call, it goes through the system, it uses caller ID to log a call in WinFS, it attaches that call to an contact using caller ID, and that contact has information entered in WinFS as a Person Schema.
As a third party developer, I can write an application that says "Show me a list of all People that called me last week", and I will get a dataset that includes that information. Since the People schema is a public and well known one, I will know how to parse that and get information I want for my application. I can also extend that information with application specific information, similar to XML extensibility.
There is also the ability to create new schemas, so that I can store my application's data through the WinFS engine, and make it available to other applications/processes etc. while maintaining whatever security levels you want to place there, but of course that gets complicated.
The plans, as far as I know are in flux, and this is a major undertaking, so who knows what will actually come out of it. Potentially, it provides a way to create an ecosystyem of understandable data and delivers incentives for third parties to publish domain specific schemas, and incentives for third parties to provide metadata adders/gatherers.
One complaint is that it would be very difficult to add metadata by hand. But, if the system is always monitoring, it is possible to gather quite a bit of metadata, and with prompts, it becomes easy to imagine a system using face recognition software to compile a list of photos that match a face, and then prompt you to link it to a contact, and with Web Services, it is possible to poll the web for any changes to your metadata, say a contact's phone number.
In short, WinFS is less about search, although it adds a lot to that, than it is to sharing data in a cross application way. sorry for carrying on.

|5.4.05 @ 11:45AM|#

joe,

If you're retired, you aren't "earning" anything. That's why it's called "retirement".

|5.4.05 @ 12:19PM|#

Fine, jc, I'll play along with your superscrupulous word games, and rephrase as:

So when we're talking about cutting people's benefits, those who earned $35,000 a year during their working lives are "well-off," but when we're talking about the payroll tax, those earning $95,000 a year are "productive but not exactly wealthy."