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On Sun, 13 Dec 2009 17:50:08 -0000, Daniel James <daniel@xxxxxxxxxx>
wrote:
>In article <31303030373730364B247AEA41@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>, Johnny B Good
>wrote:
>
>> I wasn't referring to the GUI/mouse pointer thing. I was referring to
>> the idea of 'sanitizing' file names in explorer so as to avoid
>> confusing the hell out of any Apple Mac refugees.
>
>Leaving off the file extension, you mean? That is unhelpful, yes. I
>wouldn't say it was taken from Apple, though, there are other systems
>that don't have (or don't use) file extensions at all (except for
>compatibility).
Entertainingly, this is now out of date. Leopard (10.5) and before
used the File Type and File Creator (really File Opener) codes to
associate individual files with whatever app you liked, no messing
around with extensions. We liked this, although it causes interop
problems when you mail someone a .doc without a .doc extension.
But! Snow Leopard (10.6) now uses file extensions as the primary key
for application association, though you can still set a MIME-style
extra attribute as the secondary key to hold the creator if you want
to tag an individual file to open in an alternative app. This is
generally considered a step backwards, as it gets lost when you move
it by mail.
And even worse, to make this bad idea of using extensions less obvious
individual files have a "hide extension" attribute that is set by
default by many apps. You can disable the hide system-wide though.
Bag'o'shite.
There is one good thing that OSX recently nicked from Windows though -
you can now hover a file over a Dock icon and that app will pop to the
surface so you can drop the file onto the right window.
Cheers - Jaimie
--
I hope I live long enough
to vindicate my pessimism -- http://www.boasas.com/?c=1108
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