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Whenever I see a post like this I think it's circling around a different problem. It would seem that the overall task or project that a person is using the com

Whenever I see a post like this I think it's circling around a different problem. It would seem that the overall task or project that a person is using the computer for in a particular moment is important but there is no modern OS (that I know of) that keeps track of this context. Such a system might be a sort of metadata API for tasks or projects. The system would have a built in task tracking application that would interface with this API. (Which could be pluggable) The metadata for a task could hold a lot of information. For example a default directory where files for the task are stored could be created when the task is created. Other applications like a word processor could query the API to find out where to store its files. Web browsers could store what pages a user looks at for a task. E-Mail clients could offer the current task as a folder to store messages in. When the user switches tasks the currently open applications would be messaged and could open files the user had open when they were perviously working on that task. Finally when a user marks a task as completed all the files and messages related to that task could be archived together. For the novice user of this system things like the file system go away. Their view is the projects that they are currently working on. The file system will still be there under the covers but user doesn't need to see it. The power user might have tools for developing common project workflows.

XorNot 13y ago
This is a very complex way of reaching the idea that we have a master "Project" folder on my drive. The key innovation you're actually pushing is that we need less applications insisting on storing data in "their" format. I would love it if I could just map IMAP folders straight to actual folders on my hard drive for mail messages, so when I drag stuff out of my inbox its getting saved to the appropriate place that I can later zip up and backup wherever.
marcosdumay 13y ago
From their early documents, it looks like the KDE4 developers got out to create exactly what you describe. But they created something with very little semblance with this. What you describe is hard, and may not be possible to define well enough for implementing. It's good to know that some people try it, maybe someday somebody will get there. But, anyway, no you'll still need a filesystem to organize the data you use on each task. Do you use only one level of directories?

XorNot 13y ago

This is a very complex way of reaching the idea that we have a master "Project" folder on my drive. The key innovation you're actually pushing is that we need less applications insisting on storing data in "their" format. I would love it if I could just map IMAP folders straight to actual folders on my hard drive for mail messages, so when I drag stuff out of my inbox its getting saved to the appropriate place that I can later zip up and backup wherever.

marcosdumay 13y ago

From their early documents, it looks like the KDE4 developers got out to create exactly what you describe. But they created something with very little semblance with this. What you describe is hard, and may not be possible to define well enough for implementing. It's good to know that some people try it, maybe someday somebody will get there. But, anyway, no you'll still need a filesystem to organize the data you use on each task. Do you use only one level of directories?