Moving open files

[Dotan Cohen]

2008/7/8 Bart Silverstrim <bsilver at chrononomicon.com>:
>> When a human moves a stapler from one drawer to another, he has no
>> reason to suspect that any modification to the stapler (such as
>> refilling it) would cause a duplicate stapler to appear in the old
>> drawer. Likewise with the movement of open files. This seems to be a
>> real 'gotcha' or trap that one could very easily fall into.
>
> Staplers aren't abstractions that would easily allow for one person to
> refill it while another person is stapling with it. For this case, it's
> a bad analogy.

Neither are the user's files, for all he understands. He knows that HE
opened it, HE moved it, HE edited it, and HE saved it. Now, why aren't
the changes in the file?

You and me understand why without silly analogies, but the description
above is how the user sees it. No analogy needed.

>>> That said, if OO kept the file
>>> open, then mv could move it elsewhere, but OO would still write to the
>>> _file_ not create a new file with the original name.
>
> I think the application had a file handle it was manipulating, not a file.
>
> You get similar weird behaviors if under Windows someone has permissions
> to create a file but not alter the file. They can create a document and
> open it under Office, but not actually save anything to it once the
> initial file is written out since they can create but not alter it.

I understand that Windows has it's quirks. But I've never seen the
situation where one can create but not alter a file. I don't think
that is a situation a user who only does word processing and internet
browsing with his machine will get himself into.

>>Plus, it really is
>>> badly behaved if it writes a "new" file - when it should know it's
>>> modifying an old file - and doesn't bother to inform the user that the file
>>> moved.  _That_ should be fairly simple to both fix and get attention for.
>
> It's an Office application, not a file manager. File management falls
> under duties for the Operating System...

My thoughts exactly.

Dotan Cohen

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