You know, this makes me wonder.. tangentially speaking- I wonder how hard it would be to rearrange the folder structure in linux so that I have something like this:
The only real holdouts are proc/sys/dev which are the kernel and mnt/media/opt/srv which are really for the user/sysadmin and aren't really used by the OS anymore.
Is it coincidence that you almost exactly replicated what macOS has? Except that /Devices is /Volumes, .../Apps is .../Applications. and /Boot is handled differently.
Of course, that's not perfect either, because a) decades of changes vs. compatibility have made it less clean in certain places, and b) pretty much all the POSIX paths still exist for unix-y compatibility, but overall it's like that.
> I wonder how hard it would be to rearrange the folder structure in linux
Restructuring the directories is the easy part. You just delete the old tree and make a new one. You can also mount procfs and sysfs wherever you want.
The hard part is modifying existing software to work with the new tree. So many programs assume you have a "standard" file system tree. So many programs assume procfs is mounted at /proc. So many programs have hardcoded paths. Shared library locationd can become part of the binaries when they're compiled. It's insane and you'd essentially be creating a new Linux distribution.
Yeah, it's a junction point, but it's also useless. Open a command box and CD to it; now what? A file explorer and set it as the directory, again, now what?
I know this is completely tangential. But you can Win-R and just type Documents and it will load your documents folder. Same for downloads, pictures, temp (windows temp), and I'm sure many others.
Works from File-Open dialogs and address bars and even in the command prompt you can even do "explorer documents".
"Documents and Settings" still exists on Windows 10, as a soft link to "Users".
You know, this makes me wonder.. tangentially speaking- I wonder how hard it would be to rearrange the folder structure in linux so that I have something like this:
/Users/{root, user0, user1, ... }...
/System/{Logs, Apps/{opt, container, ...}, Temp, Conf ...}...
/Devices/{Mount, sda, sdb, null ...}...
/Boot/...
GoboLinux does exactly that: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/GoboLinux
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This is what I want from Linux. Sensible & guessable names for newcomers to figure out where to put files and programs.
It's frustrating having to spend time to decide whether I should install a program in /var or /opt or /usr. What do they even mean!
So, I disagree with this convention altogether and use /apps or ~/apps now.
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I mean we're heading there with /usr being your /System. Redhat/Pottering are doing heroic work in this space.
The only real holdouts are proc/sys/dev which are the kernel and mnt/media/opt/srv which are really for the user/sysadmin and aren't really used by the OS anymore.
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Is it coincidence that you almost exactly replicated what macOS has? Except that /Devices is /Volumes, .../Apps is .../Applications. and /Boot is handled differently.
Of course, that's not perfect either, because a) decades of changes vs. compatibility have made it less clean in certain places, and b) pretty much all the POSIX paths still exist for unix-y compatibility, but overall it's like that.
> I wonder how hard it would be to rearrange the folder structure in linux
Restructuring the directories is the easy part. You just delete the old tree and make a new one. You can also mount procfs and sysfs wherever you want.
The hard part is modifying existing software to work with the new tree. So many programs assume you have a "standard" file system tree. So many programs assume procfs is mounted at /proc. So many programs have hardcoded paths. Shared library locationd can become part of the binaries when they're compiled. It's insane and you'd essentially be creating a new Linux distribution.
You don't even need to rearrange the folders themselves, just show them like that in the file explorer. Same way the windows explorer does.
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Why not just symlink them? You can have best of both worlds with relatively little effort.
Make the overlay of your dreams!
You monster!
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Couldn't you do it with plain old symlinks?
macos does something like that.
Yeah, it's a junction point, but it's also useless. Open a command box and CD to it; now what? A file explorer and set it as the directory, again, now what?
I know this is completely tangential. But you can Win-R and just type Documents and it will load your documents folder. Same for downloads, pictures, temp (windows temp), and I'm sure many others.
Works from File-Open dialogs and address bars and even in the command prompt you can even do "explorer documents".
Nothing says progress like renaming all your paths.
In the Win95 era, it was "C:\My Documents".