Wednesday, June 30, 2004
Tiger, Longhorn search for desktop answers - News - ZDNet
Here it is, the killer app for next-gen operating systems: SEARCH.
looks like both Apple & Microsoft are both after the same thing - a usable, intuitive, and effective way to find that file you vaguely recall having downloaded last night but now can't find the printout.
the problem is further compounded by an increasing reliance on distributed computing - I work from home using Remote Desktop, and I often can't remember whether I've left a file on my local machine or if it's at work.
The solutions we're seeing being thrown about seem to rely on finding new ways to search the existing data structures we already have. But the current hierarchical directory & file system really is a throw-back to the days of filing cabinets and paper folders. the similarity is of course deliberate, but these days computers offer us many more varied ways of storing and manipulating our stuff. so, what I'm getting at is a deep conviction of mine that, if we hope to be able to search our massive filestores we need to radically change how we store stuff in the first place. Some answers have cropped up, in the form of Apple's Piles (not as unpleasant as it sounds), but there's still work to be done. and from my reading of Bill Bryson's Short History of Nearly Everything, it looks like groundbreaking science is less about being consistently brilliant, and more about having just a few great ideas...
Here it is, the killer app for next-gen operating systems: SEARCH.
looks like both Apple & Microsoft are both after the same thing - a usable, intuitive, and effective way to find that file you vaguely recall having downloaded last night but now can't find the printout.
the problem is further compounded by an increasing reliance on distributed computing - I work from home using Remote Desktop, and I often can't remember whether I've left a file on my local machine or if it's at work.
The solutions we're seeing being thrown about seem to rely on finding new ways to search the existing data structures we already have. But the current hierarchical directory & file system really is a throw-back to the days of filing cabinets and paper folders. the similarity is of course deliberate, but these days computers offer us many more varied ways of storing and manipulating our stuff. so, what I'm getting at is a deep conviction of mine that, if we hope to be able to search our massive filestores we need to radically change how we store stuff in the first place. Some answers have cropped up, in the form of Apple's Piles (not as unpleasant as it sounds), but there's still work to be done. and from my reading of Bill Bryson's Short History of Nearly Everything, it looks like groundbreaking science is less about being consistently brilliant, and more about having just a few great ideas...
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