Rant time
Okay, it’s rant time. I just read Yet Another Linux Sux Rant ®. As with all YALSRs, one of the main rants is that the filesystem layout in Linux (and all Unix varients) it impossible to use for the average user. Their solution is invariably to change the filesystem layout to be something more like Windows. I believe they’re all (yes all) missing the boat here. If a user needs to know where a program is installed, or where a library is located, and they’re incapable of following/picking up the Unix filesystem layout, then something is wrong with the user interface, not with the filesystem. Filesystem layout is completely unimportant to the average user. They should never need to leave their home directory, which can be they happy recipient of the full power of these filesystem layout design wizards. When they want to run a program, they click an icon or type a name. That’s it. All their data files and saved games are in their home directory, network shares are buttons/drop boxes in the file dialog, etc. I would even go one step further, and say that a generic computer user should not be allowed to leave their home directory. If they are a power user, then can have a power user account, with access to more of the system. If they are root, they get full access. But your mother (For some reason, all of the YALSRs use “your mother” as the prototypical knows-nothing-about-computers-but-uses-them-for-email-and-word-and-solitair user. I don’t know whose mother they’re using as this benchmark, but my mother is quite decent at computers. She better be, because my dad uses the most gods-aweful layout for his directories and menus. And they have Windows. At least if they had Linux, he couldn’t screw up the whole system, just his own stuff. Anyway…) doesn’t need access to the root of the filesystem, or the apache logs, or the library heirarchy. Period. She only needs to run programs and access data. This leavs the system designer free to lay out the directory structure however they want, including the full SUS layout, which has enormous flexibility.
Okay, rant over, for now.
Discussion Area - Leave a Comment