Live data from Hacker News

The Origins of DS_store (2006)

arno.org

171–180 of 280 posts

Re: The Origins of DS_store (2006)

#171

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A lot of Classic Mac apps just used the resource fork to store all their data. It was basically used as a Berkeley DB, except the keys were limited to a 32-bit OSType plus a 16-bit integer, and performance was horrible. But it got the job done when the files were small, had low on-disk overhead, and was ridiculously easy to deploy. Once you pushed an app beyond the level of usage the developer had performed in their…

The rejoicing was definitely not universal. It really felt like the NeXT folks wanted to throw out pretty much the entire Mac (except keeps its customer base and apps) and any compatibility had to be fought for through customer complaints. Personally, MacOS X bundles (directories that were opaque in the Finder) seemed like a decent enough replacement for resource forks. The problem was that lots of NeXT-derived utili…

MacOS X bundles are actually NeXTStep bundles, and are behind the same idea in Java JAR files with META-INF directory, and .NET resources, due to Objective-C's legacy on all those systems.

Re: The Origins of DS_store (2006)

#172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>The Finder has so many bizarre quirks and it's so slow to proliferate updates that it's just embarrassing Say what you will about Windows, but the Explore file manager has always been pretty rock solid.

Hmm. Wasn't it completely unreliable for moving around large numbers of files at the same time? Like if file #243 of 400 failed for some reason, you could actually lose data? I don't know any more because I use Total Commander on Windows...

I'm not aware of any bugs like that. Got any links maybe?

Re: The Origins of DS_store (2006)

#173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hmm. Wasn't it completely unreliable for moving around large numbers of files at the same time? Like if file #243 of 400 failed for some reason, you could actually lose data? I don't know any more because I use Total Commander on Windows...

I'm not aware of any bugs like that. Got any links maybe?

No, it may have been windows 95 :)

I prefer the good ole two pane file managers and I actively avoid both the finder and explorer most of the time.

Re: The Origins of DS_store (2006)

#174
When I saw `DS_store` inside the title, my eyes automatically filtered out and ignored that word for few seconds. I had to re-read.

That's how I see these files. And maybe one day, we can have and edit our own .gitignore -like files for such Inattentional blindness[0].

[0]: Inattentional blindness

Re: The Origins of DS_store (2006)

#175
post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I credit ResEdit hacking partially for steering my path towards becoming a programmer. I had my Classic Mac OS installs throughly customized, as well as the other various programs and games that stored their assets in resource forks. It was a lot of fun and something I’ve missed in modern computing. Not even desktop Linux is really fills that void. ResEdit and the way it exposed everything complete with built-in edit…

ResEdit and using it to modify Escape Velocity is 100% the reason I’m still in this industry.

Same here but only for joining the industry. Now it's the opposite, that webdev still hasn't reached that level of maturity of classic Mac OS makes me want to quit.

Re: The Origins of DS_store (2006)

#176

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Explorer uses a hidden desktop.ini file for this.

Negative. desktop.ini doesn't get edited when you switch (for example) from Details to List. Also, I think only the desktop allows moving icons around freely.

> only the desktop allows moving icons around freely

I'm pretty sure Windows used to allow you to move icons around, I clearly remember making a mess on some Windows 98 folders. Maybe they removed that feature recently?

Re: The Origins of DS_store (2006)

#177

Earlier quoted context omitted.

All file operations have been watched by Spotlight since forever at this point.

Except for ignored file types and folders you marked as private.

Or those on network volumes or removable media. When somebody else on other machine removes them, your local database is out of sync pronto.

Re: The Origins of DS_store (2006)

#178
post #164

Earlier quoted context omitted.

macOS is tricky now. I just looked via Finder to see if I had any .DS_Store files on my network volumes, and it appeared not. However, when I went to Terminal, sure enough, they were there. I now can't trust Finder's ability to show hidden files, as it only shows the hidden files it thinks a user should care about, rather than all hidden files. Not good. Since my network shares are for a local Synology, it's not a a…

If I remember correctly there is an option in Synology DSM to not let clients create .DS_Store files in network shares.

It is a samba feature, called veto. You can define there, what you don't want on your shares, starting from .DS_Store and Thumbs.db, to *.mp3, for example.

Re: The Origins of DS_store (2006)

#179
post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

macOS is tricky now. I just looked via Finder to see if I had any .DS_Store files on my network volumes, and it appeared not. However, when I went to Terminal, sure enough, they were there. I now can't trust Finder's ability to show hidden files, as it only shows the hidden files it thinks a user should care about, rather than all hidden files. Not good. Since my network shares are for a local Synology, it's not a a…

My synology NAS drops turds in lots of directories too.

Your synology has its own way to store xattrs and alternate file streams, in the @eaDir, so some of the turds may be dropped by your windows or mac client machine. But yes, it also does few of its own things for the other software running on your box, like for example SYNOINDEX_MEDIA_INFO for known media files.

Re: The Origins of DS_store (2006)

#180
post #4

It's worth mentioning how to turn off the creation of .DS_Store files by default while browsing network volumes - otherwise the directory modified timestamps are updated as you browse using the Finder, which is Just Plain Terrible. https://old.reddit.com/r/MacOS/comments/lvju40/comment/gpc8i...

Personally I make sure mac users do this before they get write access to a network share. It's just a matter of common curtesy IMHO.

Set up a veto on your network share (https://www.samba.org/samba/docs/current/man-html/smb.conf.5...).
Post reply on HN