File not found - Please tell me this is a joke... - Page 1
Forum section: electronics / general

author: Karel
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: September 30, 2021, 01:55:34 pm
content: New college students not understanding nested folders!"A generation that grew up with Google is forcing professors to rethink their lesson plans"https://www.theverge.com/22684730/students-file-folder-directory-structure-education-gen-z

author: xrunner
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: September 30, 2021, 02:07:54 pm
content: They probably don't know what the "save" icon on many programs is either. Like right now I'm using Fusion 360, and to save a file you must click on an icon of a 3.5" floppy disk. A couple of years ago I asked my niece and nephew what that symbol was (on another program), they didn't know. I had brought over a real 3.5" floppy disk and showed it to them. They had no clue what it was for.

author: richard.cs
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: September 30, 2021, 02:17:06 pm
content: To be fair the logo is often a bit small and stylised. I grew up with floppies and still didn't make the connection immediately.

author: cgroen
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: September 30, 2021, 02:36:20 pm
content: Well if the new generation can be offended by MOSI and MISO meaning MASTER and SLAVE, no wonder they don't know folders. Maybe they should get their priorities straight(I even heard that some of them claims that a kilobyte is 1000 bytes)

author: Benta
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: September 30, 2021, 03:51:13 pm
content: Quote from: cgroen on September 30, 2021, 02:36:20 pmIt is when you ask the hard drive manufacturers.

author: cgroen
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: September 30, 2021, 04:10:11 pm
content: Quote from: Benta on September 30, 2021, 03:51:13 pmI know. They did it (way back) to get larger numbers, once all did it, no benefit. Its just plain stupid (most words needs a context, MASTER and SLAVE as well as KILO means something different depending on the context)

author: m98
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: September 30, 2021, 05:24:21 pm
content: An effect of those students only using Chromebooks and Smartphones? But even there you find directory structures everywhere, be it in cloud drives, photo management, or the native file structure.

author: CatalinaWOW
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: September 30, 2021, 05:54:59 pm
content: Yeah the file save icon is outmoded. But it is no more obscure than many other icons. You just have to learn that the image means save. I think the real driver of the issue described in the article is that search works so well and storage is so cheap that many find heap storage works for them. It avoids the problem of defining an organization structure and then doing filing work. And at least part of the problem has been around since these students were dreams in their parents future. Remember the confusion when MS introduced the documents, photos and other folders as part of a standard structure. Many peoples smallest organizational unit was Drive C:

author: magic
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: September 30, 2021, 07:09:16 pm
content: Quote from: m98 on September 30, 2021, 05:24:21 pmWhat's a "directory structures", my instagram doesn't seem to have that oneQuote from: cgroen on September 30, 2021, 02:36:20 pmOh sweaty, not sure if you realize how problematic this is. Please use "get their priorities linear" instead.

author: cgroen
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: September 30, 2021, 07:10:50 pm
content: Quote from: magic on September 30, 2021, 07:09:16 pmDamn, I knew I would end up in trouble with that

author: MrMobodies
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: September 30, 2021, 07:52:42 pm
content: I had a few Windows Vista customers over a decade ago who thought they lost all their work.All it turned out to be the "Libraries" features was broken and not showing their documents as they expected.I always disabled the libraries feature and disable breadcrumbs as I find it is important to not exactly where things are on the file system.Starting from Vista I find the search defaults don't help where they put "folder" which shows the folder name first putting the path afterwards but the folder name seems to be in the way (confuses me a little when they maybe many folders in the same name) so I change that to path.QuoteI remembered a college I walked out of 20 years ago. I wasn't happy with the curriculum and the attitude that not many people pass the course and so on. I think it might of been some NVQ 2 or 3 "computing course" and it was only 2 hours one day a week where the journey getting there took longer. The other students who decided to attend the course came to me with a lengthy helpdesk style question within the first two weeks of starting there. It was to do with modems. Some of them haven't seen a modem before and weren't shown one during their lesson but I collect stuff so I showed them some modems I got down the bootsale. Nothing complicated, an RJ11 style socket to connect to the phone line and some had another RJ11 socket to connect like an LJU adapter so you can plug a phone into it if you wanted to but the few of the older ISA ones I had in my collection did had LJU sockets on them.When I narrowed the question down, check your connections that you plugged the telephone line in the right socket if there are two RJ11 sockets and I have seen them have symbols in the back marking them for which one is for the line and phone. They were told it was a "real life question" of a help desk helping a customer on the phone about resolving no internet connectivity. I didn't find it clear or descriptive and nothing much about the equipment to determine the above as a possibility.They got that one right in the end which they were pleased about but a couple months later they got bored and gradually bunked it off.That's nothing to be pleased aboutwhen learning without understanding.

author: tooki
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: September 30, 2021, 09:00:54 pm
content: Even more unjustified bashing on young people for stupid stuff. The reason they don’t know it, if they don’t know it, is that nobody taught them. Older generations didn’t “just know it” either. Nobody knew how to use computers, so everyone was taught somehow. We incorrectly assume that by virtue of growing up with them around that kids will know how to use computers, and that’s just not true. Older people who weren’t taught also don’t know how to use them. I’ve worked as a computer tech and salesperson before, and customers who storealltheir files on the desktop go back to the earliest days of GUI computers.The only reason we notice it now is because these days, using computers is absolutely inescapable; 20-30 years ago one could still choose to do things the old way.

author: magic
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: September 30, 2021, 09:23:32 pm
content: Those "children" are engineering students, dude. Have been using computers for a decade.QuoteIf I could go back in time to strangle to death one historic figure of my choice in his crib, it wouldn't be Hitler or Trotsky but Steve Jobs.

author: m98
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: September 30, 2021, 10:26:21 pm
content: Quote from: tooki on September 30, 2021, 09:00:54 pmHow can you just never have been exposed to the physical concept of files and folders, even if you haven't ever heard of the virtual pendent?Seriously, someone who doesn't know such stuff by the time they're in college should really reconsider if they have enough natural curiosity to enjoy an engineering career...

author: Red Squirrel
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 01, 2021, 01:38:25 am
content: Reminds me of my dad, he has no clue about directory structures and no matter how much I try to explain it to him he just can't figure it out. The whole concept of "where did the file go" is a mystery to him. He has a screensaver with photos that he adds to but in his mind, it only works with his camera and not his phone, because if he plugs his phone into the computer the pictures don't show up in the same place so the process of putting them in the screensaver folder is broken.Crazy to see even young people not grasping this concept though, but it comes to show just how bad this whole "make everything cloud based" society is. They just grew up without having a second thought as to where their data is. Kind of scary.I'm the opposite I want to know exactly where my data is. I don't like when programs start storing things like settings in some location I don't know. I want to be in full control, and make sure I am backing up the data correctly.

author: xrunner
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 01, 2021, 01:49:15 am
content: Quote from: Red Squirrel on October 01, 2021, 01:38:25 amYep my neighbor is the same. I help him as much as I can with PC issues but there are concepts he hasn't grasped for years as I've kept explaining it over and over. Like when he got a new PC, he wanted to know how we'd get his gmail over to the new PC. He was really worried about it. I said we don't have to move the messages because they are .. well ... look just trust me on this OK? I wasn't about to try to explain it because it would have been to no avail.He grew up in a different time and just can't grasp many things about computers and files. Some of the questions he asks me make me shudder, because I am here to answer them but I think about all the other people who don't have a trusted person to help them. This is how scammers succeed I guess.

author: Red Squirrel
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 01, 2021, 01:58:07 am
content: Lol that reminds me of panicked calls I've had before working help desk. "I accidentally deleted Google!"

author: sleemanj
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 01, 2021, 02:06:35 am
content: To be fair, particularly with any user generated files (documents, photos, videos, whatever), a directory structure isn't necessarily the best way of doing things if your OS/filesystem can keep an indexed database of all the contents and you could assign tags and search it rapidly using the powerful computers we have at our disposal now.A directory structure offloads the work of searching and categorising to the user, but is necessarily restrictive in terms of classification (unless you get into symlinking a lot). But documents can be usefully classified in many ways. Do you put Joe Blogg's Fishing Licence Application into the Bloggs folder, the Fishing Licence folder, or the Pending Applications folder.Most people only create documents where dumping them all in the same place and just searching for them is a perfectly useful, less work, and more flexible solution in the modern world.

author: rsjsouza
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 01, 2021, 02:48:46 am
content: Quote from: sleemanj on October 01, 2021, 02:06:35 amIndeed. The files and programs tend to be found via the "search" button in your device (with the appropriate tracking being sent to the mothership, of course!)Quote from: sleemanj on October 01, 2021, 02:06:35 amI don't think it is very restrictive, but it surely requires one to think about an organizational system that works for him/her. My mother, for example, absolutely despised computers up to a very late stage in her life (early 60's) but had to cave in so she could get on with her interests. Despite being a user for about ten years now, she still has no concept of the physical location of files and directories on a disk but learned how to move her e-mails (together with the attachments) to different folders in Thunderbird. Although this abstraction works for her while within the Thunderbird application, she has a mental disconnect to remember or understand what happened when an attachment was saved to the disk, regardless of how many times I explained (and yes, I am averythorough and patient teacher). A younger user has the same disconnect happening.Even the naming convention brings you back to a time where people actually used physical File cabinets and directory reference books to find things.Quote from: sleemanj on October 01, 2021, 02:06:35 amAnd not only that, but documents, photos, etc. tend to be very ephemeral as they usually need to last on a device just enough to be "shared" with another app (Instagram, Facebook, Tiktok, etc.)

author: CatalinaWOW
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 01, 2021, 04:36:28 am
content: I find structured directories very useful. My file system is large enough that a search through all of it is not fast. The structure allows me to narrow the range before using search functions. But I also recognize that the organization is idiosyncratic and would not help others. I had this concept forcibly demonstrated to me when I inherited a project contained on a Unix workstation. The originator was no longer accessible without divine help, and he had a complex structure made more obscure by massive use of aliases. There were a huge number of paths through the tree. I never did fully understand his intent, or find everything that would have been useful.

author: james_s
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 01, 2021, 04:44:36 am
content: Directory structures are just innately logical, I cannot even comprehend how someone could have difficulty with it. I have separate rooms in my house, within those rooms I have various pieces of furniture and built in storage like closets. Within those pieces of furniture and closets I have boxes, bags, folders, and other containers. Within those various containers I have other objects.Do kids these days live in a big empty room and just throw all of their possessions into one big pile?And these are engineering students, not artists or language majors, sorry but I'm going to judge them more harshly and expect them to figure out stuff like this without asking the professor with help. If growing up with Google is the problem, they should know how to ask Google. If they cannot even figure this out then how can they be expected to solve difficult problems in their job and why should I consider hiring them?

author: james_s
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 01, 2021, 04:51:13 am
content: Quote from: xrunner on October 01, 2021, 01:49:15 amThe emails aren't on the PC in the first place, they're somewhere out in the world, and the PC is just a vehicle to take you to them. If you go out and buy a new car you don't have to find all new stores to go to, the same stores you visited with your old car are still there and the new car will take you to them the same way.

author: MrMobodies
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 01, 2021, 04:56:21 am
content: Quote from: m98 on September 30, 2021, 10:26:21 pmWhen I was about 10 I had an Atari STE and that had a file system that you couldn't help not notice especially with the non auto boot floppy discs where you'd just manually run the .prg files and I found it all quite basic and straight forward.

author: CJay
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 01, 2021, 06:26:28 am
content: Quote from: james_s on October 01, 2021, 04:51:13 amExcept you can use a local mail client with GMail and download messages so for someone who grew up using an email client with local storage it's really not a stupid question.

author: CJay
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 01, 2021, 06:38:16 am
content: I work 'in IT', we've got professors, doctors, highly qualified engineers, people who speak to and advise governments etc.We're huge, wherevere you are in the world there's a really good chance you're relying on or are connected to a bit of our technology as you read this, if you're not right now then you probably have been or will be.Some of the things I hear every week go along the lines of "I'm so stupid I don't understand how" or "I'm such an idiot when it comes to computers".People don't say that because they are stupid but because they are defending themselves against the kind of sneering, elitist attitudes being displayed in this thread.Give your heads a wobble and think about how you'd feel if someone you were looking to for advice told you you're an idiot for not intuitively understanding something that you didn't need to know to do your job, don't care about or have never seen before and are completely alien to you.

author: magic
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 01, 2021, 07:24:27 am
content: Quote from: xrunner on October 01, 2021, 01:49:15 amI have once been asked about the details of that apparent miracle by a tinfoil-hatter but didn't dare to answer(Which is to say, most communications protocols people use are frankly garbage from a privacy standpoint).

author: Miyuki
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: October 01, 2021, 07:26:42 am
content: Quote from: CJay on October 01, 2021, 06:38:16 amI also have some experience with professors and so (governments)And when mechanical engineers use computers it is terrible, local folders, the shared folders it is all one big messDon't know how nontechnical are, I expect it to be unbelievable worseBut still, it is surprising to see CAD persons have problems with handling computer

author: magic
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 01, 2021, 07:35:53 am
content: I have no problem with people who grew up in the past millennium and never caught up.But kids that live glued up to their spyphones and never stop to consider where the data go, that's a different matter.Even my mother understands basics of file storage and has over 1TB of downloaded junk stashed on her computer

author: Kleinstein
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 01, 2021, 08:34:56 am
content: There was a time before a directory tree. With smaller discs there was no need to have subdirectories.The directory tree is also only one possibility to organize the data on a disc. Many of us are used to it, but there are alternatives like a more data-base form. Especially with SSDs do allow a more random access. In some aspects the file system is still from the times of magnetic tapes.

author: GlennSprigg
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 01, 2021, 11:30:41 am
content: Quote from: Red Squirrel on October 01, 2021, 01:38:25 amYES!!!... That's exactly how I feel !! Computers are/were supposed to make it easy & friendly for even non-technical people, so they tried to usefriendly words like 'My', as in 'My Computer', and 'My Documents etc etc... Aargh!! I HATE trying to explain to some people why/where there files actually went,to places like... "C:\ProgramFiles\User\Fred-Bloggs\Local\Documents\MyPhotos\blaablaa", or "My Computer\My Documents\My Music" or what ever!!I KNOW why they TRY to do this, especially for multiple Users signing on to a PC. But very few 'laymen' really understand!.I've always taught my family/kids to simply create their OWN Directory/Subdirectories in the Drive/Partition of their choice, and structure it Simply, for all theirphotos, music, letters etc. And to back up that one master directory when ever you need. My 'Missus' has taken a long time to understand though...She has thousands of Embroidery files, that I find scattered everywhere, on multiple drives, even 'Recovery' partitions & Root Directories!! She opens '.zip'files, without contemplating/remembering where they are being extracted to!! (Sigh...) So I build for her the likes of a Master Directory called "Embroidery"...And off that, Sub-Directories like 'Butterflies', or 'Football', or 'Birds'/'Disney'/'lace' etc etc, and Sub-Directories off of those... She's finally 'getting' it !!

author: tooki
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 01, 2021, 11:39:29 am
content: Quote from: m98 on September 30, 2021, 10:26:21 pmThe chances of a young person these days having interacted with a filing cabinet are, frankly, vastly smaller than the chances of them having interacted with a computer directory structure!!It was always a tenuous analogy anyway, since we don’t interact with paper the same way we do with computer data.And besides, people are often extremely talented in one discipline and not in another, and engineering is no exception. Hell, I had an IT professor who’d literally written our textbook on management information systems, yet struggled to use PowerPoint on a daily basis. (I’ve never seen anyone before or since who always advanced slides by right clicking and then clicking “Next slide”!)I once made $300 (nearly all for travel) to go plug in a pair of PC speakers for a guy. This guy was a brain surgeon. He couldliterallyrewire your brain, but couldn’t plug in two cables.Quote from: CJay on October 01, 2021, 06:38:16 amThank you, well said!The user behavior you describe is called “learned helplessness”, and I 100% agree that elitist attitudes reinforce it.

author: xrunner
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 01, 2021, 11:45:22 am
content: Quote from: james_s on October 01, 2021, 04:51:13 amUh-huh, yea. If so, then how can the emails appear on his PC if they are somewhere else? If they are "on" Google somewhere then how can I see themhere? See you and I understand these things but he doesn't. I've been very patient over the years but I can only go so far.Like this last week he has had a hearing problem and is going to get hearing aids. His hearing issue is the reverse of what I've ever known - the sounds from the outside world are too loud, not too weak. Anyway he went to the audiologist and is going to get a kit that will help the issue. He said they have an app that will work on an iPhone to allow a person to adjust the hearing aids and he wanted to know where to get a cheap iPhone. He owns an iPad which I got him into several years ago so he could watch his college games and do other things easily (another teaching foray ...). Anyway I told him, well why do you need an iPhone when you have an iPad?He said because the lady said the app runs on an iPhone. I said I'll bet you $50 it will be just fine on the iPad. I guarantee you it uses Bluetooth and so it'll work on either one. Well lo and behold of course it is fine to run on an iPad. It's an apple app. He thought I was a genius (I am most certainly not). Then he wanted to get something that made repetitive "clicks" or "beeps" because that is the type of sound that irritates his hearing. He wanted to know if I had a metronome or anything that made loud clicks so he could take it to the audiologist and test the adjustments. I said why don't you get a metronome app for the iPad and use that? I never looked for that kind of app but I was certain they existed. Well what do you know - of course there are metronome apps - quite a few. See he doesn't think like we do. He can't seem to imagine such a solution even though to me that was the first thing I thought of.I do my best but I know when to just tell him what to do and not try to explain beyond a certain point.

author: Miyuki
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: October 01, 2021, 11:57:19 am
content: Quote from: Kleinstein on October 01, 2021, 08:34:56 amFile system (folders and directories) is just a human readable presentation of data on block devices under it, folders are completely virtual concepAll "modern" devices/systems use libraries (for images, music, and so on) and shove files to strangely named folder on filesystem

author: ajb
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 01, 2021, 07:36:11 pm
content: Quote from: rsjsouza on October 01, 2021, 02:48:46 amThis right here reflects a fundamental problem with the basic assumptions of this thread. Files/folders/directories are NOT reflective of the "physical" location of data on disk. A file "in" a given directory may be located anywhere on disk, even broken up into multiple bits spread across the whole thing. Directory trees are just one method of logically organizing and locating data within a collection, and they are not inherently a better way of doing that than other methods such as a large searchable pool, or a set of tags, or whatever. In fact some of those methods are far better suited to some workflows/use cases than directories. A lot of us are used to directory trees because that's been the dominant abstraction provided to us, and we've had not choice but to use them for many years. The fact that we find it so natural (to the point that we assume -- or at least our language implies -- that it reflects a fundamental physical reality of disk storage) is a reflection of our familiarity with it, not our intelligence.People who have come up in the age of google docs etc have had the advantage of other options when it comes to organizing and interacting with documents and media, and simply don't need to worry about the directory/folder abstraction as much as we had to. If I want to find a particular photo of my orange cat in Google Photos, for example, I don't have to browse to the "cat" folder in my "photos" folder and then click on each file to see if it's the one I want. I can simply type "orange cat" into the search box, and an incredible amount of machine learning technology instantly shows me all of the photos of that cat in a fast, easy to browse list of thumbnails. It's night and day compared to the experience of just twenty years ago. Sure it's not perfect and has some downsides, but why would the average person bother with manually sorting all of their photos into folders if it's so easy to find things WITHOUT doing that?Quote from: m98 on September 30, 2021, 10:26:21 pmIt used to be that every office had tons of filing cabinets for all of the paper documents they needed to conduct business. You might even have multiple employees, or even an entire department, dedicated to just dealing with files. I remember my old doctor's office had a whole wall of cabinets for patient files. That's not how things are anymore. I still have a filing cabinet in my office, but like 1/4 of one drawer is old paper documents I haven't looked at in years, one drawer is for boxes of printable label stock, and the last drawer is where I keep my snacks. Here again, a lot of us who came up in that earlier time, where we had to do everything on paper, and thus had to *organize* all of that paper, then experienced the shift to electronic documents, where there was a direct parallel between 'a document' on paper and 'a document' as a digital file, can easily mistake our familiarity with the abstraction and where it comes from for intelligence. It's increasingly easy for a person to come up without ever needing to deal with enough paper to directly experience that parallel. Besides, it's not even that good of a parallel these days. Sure, a PDF is generally interchangeable, in terms of content and functionality, with a paper document, but not all data that we deal with is like that.QuoteGet over yourself. Not all STEM is engineering. Not all engineering is computer engineering. You can't expect someone to be conversant in the various archaic abstractions of every other STEM discipline just because they're interested in one discipline.

author: james_s
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 01, 2021, 07:50:47 pm
content: Quote from: CJay on October 01, 2021, 06:26:28 amAnd I do, but the emails are still on the server, the email client just makes a local copy of them. It's like taking a photo of some landmarks and bringing the photos home with you. The landmarks are still there, you can buy a new camera and still go out and take photos of the same landmarks and look at them later.

author: james_s
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 01, 2021, 07:54:43 pm
content: Quote from: tooki on October 01, 2021, 11:39:29 amSurely they've interacted with a cardboard box before though, or a plastic storage bin, or a closet, or a chest of drawers, or a backpack. They've used a desk at some point and probably had some pens and pencils or other tools. Heck even my modern iPhone has albums that photos are sorted into, they aren't all just in a big disorganized pile. The concept of nested containers is pretty hard to avoid unless a person is just completely lacking any sort of organizational skills, in which case they're going to struggle in any sort of engineering job.

author: rsjsouza
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 01, 2021, 08:37:57 pm
content: Quote from: ajb on October 01, 2021, 07:36:11 pmThe location of the file and its fragmentation is not part of the problem. A file is still the lowest abstraction level of a coherent dataset that a user can interface on the context that I presented (and you suppressed) of a single user machine. Of course, "physical" is a simplification on my part since a file can be mapped to a physical drive, someone else's computer (the cloud or a mapped network), a stream, etc. but it works very well to illustrate to a beginner the function/necessity of such abstraction to exist.

author: MrMobodies
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 01, 2021, 08:41:44 pm
content: Quote from: GlennSprigg on October 01, 2021, 11:30:41 amThen there was the "libraries" and the "breadcrumb" thing (and also now "Quick Access" in Windows 10) that interferes or gets in the way that I absolutely despise starting from Vista that most of the time tells me bugger all so I just remove it altogether and Classic shell takes care of the breadcrumb problem that causes me confusion with the arrows and the sizing for something suppose to be so simply displayed couldn't be more clearer.I remember some customers in the past who believed they lost all their stuff when it was actually libraries feature (back over 10 years) that sometimes broke and didn't show anything in their "libraries" folder. My solution, remove/disable libraries from the registry so it don't show up again, show them what folders their stuff maybe stored in, show hidden and operating system files to see everything, untick "hide extensions for file types", disable breadcrumbs so they can see exactly where the folder is easily (that would have given them a clue where their stuff was if it shown in the address bar instead "->libraries->"), and set defaults to detail view and arrange the field to something like, name type, size, created, modified and in search replace "folder" to "path".Quite a few of them only after they had a problem like that seem to take things more seriously, they brought backup drives and what they believe was so difficult before only took a couple of seconds when I showed them manually how to copy stuff over and working a simple backup script.Very simple stuff but maybe they could see what they were doing for the first time when setting the preferences to the above.I am thinking over simplified and dumbed down can lead to this problem

author: CJay
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 01, 2021, 09:53:07 pm
content: Quote from: james_s on October 01, 2021, 07:50:47 pmNo, they weren't usually left on the server, they were deleted when downloaded, storage used to be expensive. You can still have your email client delete them.

author: TERRA Operative
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 02, 2021, 04:32:38 am
content: Quote from: xrunner on October 01, 2021, 01:49:15 amMaybe try explaining to him that his emails are stored securely on the internet kind of like a PO box.Even though he changes address (ie. gets a new computer) the computer can still access the PO box from the new address just like from the old address.

author: vk6zgo
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 02, 2021, 05:59:57 am
content: Quote from: cgroen on September 30, 2021, 04:10:11 pmIt all goes back to "computer people" ignoring the very long standing convention that "kilo' means 1000 times whatever the base quantity is, without any need of a "context".Perhaps they should have invented a different word for "1024 bytes"----- sloppy word usage comes back to "bite us on the bum", even if it is many years later.Another perfectly good word appropriated from Electronics is "bandwidth".The true meaning is the amount of spectral space occupied by a signal, or the same thing for a device required to carry such signals.Because "computer people" use it in a completely different way, (perhaps describable as "virtual bandwidth") which has now captured the mainstream, we now have to use monstrously contorted sentences like the previous one to replace a simple term.

author: magic
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 02, 2021, 06:16:35 am
content: Quote from: vk6zgo on October 02, 2021, 05:59:57 amRF engineers still use "bandwidth" without worrying what computer nerds would think

author: MrMobodies
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 02, 2021, 06:50:41 am
content: QuoteA bit confused by this statement, does this mean that it is just "Stem professors" experiencing this issue or do they mean everyone else?

author: magic
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 02, 2021, 07:12:40 am
content: QuoteFTFY.It means that it's not a problem to STEM professors until it comes to teaching the "kids these days" how to operate scientific software.

author: vk6zgo
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 02, 2021, 08:05:22 am
content: Quote from: magic on October 02, 2021, 06:16:35 amI know, but it still bugs me!

author: tooki
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 02, 2021, 08:08:25 am
content: Quote from: james_s on October 01, 2021, 07:54:43 pmiPhone albums are exactlynota good example of nested file storage, since they’re neither nested, nor do they reflect how physical objects exist in only one place at a time. (And the analogy of an album containing prints, while the library holds negatives, is even less helpful to someone who’s never seen photographic film.)While I don’t disagree that difficulty in understanding nested storage isn’t likely to coincide with a good engineering mind, they are, strictly speaking, orthogonal to each other. Many brilliant engineers fall under the “idiot savant” category of people whose mental abilities have been entirely focused on one specialty to the detriment of everything else.

author: tooki
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 02, 2021, 08:10:08 am
content: Quote from: vk6zgo on October 02, 2021, 05:59:57 amYou mean like the kibibyte, mebibyte, gibibyte, etc? Yeah, those caught on like wildfire!

author: Circlotron
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 02, 2021, 09:22:32 am
content: The paths to my files all contain forward slashes.None of that backslash rubbish!

author: Karel
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 02, 2021, 10:14:07 am
content: Quote from: Circlotron on October 02, 2021, 09:22:32 amAlso, all paths on my systemsstartwith a forward slash...

author: james_s
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 02, 2021, 07:27:17 pm
content: Quote from: CJay on October 01, 2021, 09:53:07 pmIf you use POP3 yes, but I've used IMAP since ~2002 which leaves a copy on the server and downloads a local copy. Storage for emails has never been an issue in as long as I've been using email, back in the day they were simple text, hundreds of emails would fit on a floppy disk. You *can* have your email client delete them from the server, but that isn't typically how it works anymore and I see few reasons for doing so.

author: james_s
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 02, 2021, 07:38:23 pm
content: Quote from: tooki on October 02, 2021, 08:10:08 amI refuse to use those silly fake units, they were invented by the storage industry in response to lawsuits over the practice of defining megabytes as 1000 bytes to make the drives appear larger than they really are. Kilobyte is not a metric unit, yes it borrows the "kilo" word as a prefix but in the context of base 2 systems it has always meant 1024. Microsoft (so ~90% of all PCs in the world) and JEDEC still define a kilobyte as 1024 bytes and I had never even heard of a kibibyte until about a year ago and always assumed that KiB was just a European abbreviation for kilobyte. I don't know how anyone can even say kibibyte with a straight face, it sounds like a cat or dog treat. I've seen it claimed to reduce ambiguity but in reality it created ambiguity where there was none before. A kilobyte used to be universally understood to be 1024 bytes but now a small portion of people insist it to be 1000 bytes because they think it's a metric unit. So now we have metric kilobytes used mostly by pedants in Europe and standard kilobytes used by the rest of the world, with most people being totally unaware that they are not the same thing. Great, much less confusing.

author: vk6zgo
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 03, 2021, 12:51:44 am
content: Quote from: tooki on October 02, 2021, 08:10:08 amNo, that was trying to fix a stuff up after the event----I meant right at the beginning.Of course, probably, back in the day, most people in the field knew each other, & were happy using weird terminology.When it went "mainstream" (>10,000 people), it was too late to change!

author: Brumby
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: October 03, 2021, 01:50:34 am
content: Quote from: james_s on October 02, 2021, 07:27:17 pmWhat YOU use is not a good basis upon which to make broad statements that imply other options are never used (which is what your original comment quite clearly expressed).I have several email accounts for which I am responsible and I have set up POP3 for some and IMAP for others. Each has their reasons for the choice.When we are discussing matters such as we are seeing in this thread, please keep personal use or preferences clearly identified as such. Don't make sweeping statements ... they are almost certain to be wrong - and more often that one might care to admit.

author: Brumby
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: October 03, 2021, 02:34:30 am
content: Quote from: magic on October 01, 2021, 07:35:53 amIndeed .... they seemed to have survived pretty well AND provided the environment that allowed the "Information Age" to thrive.QuoteI could not disagree more.When I first started getting into computers, physical location of data was part of the planning process. In my first job, I worked on an IBM mainframe and you specified the location of the tracks to be used for each file. The same file would always be located in exactly the same place.When I moved to a company that had implemented the next evolution, specifying the file location was simply given with pack name and size. You no longer had to know where the data was on that volume - you had to trust that the computer would keep track of that. This was very unnerving at first, but I got used to it.THIS is the start of travelling down the path that we find ourselves in today. Physical location of data became less important, as the capabilities of system software to keep track of it improved to the point where the biggest question is "Do I have enough space on my 4TB drive?" Then we step into the realm of internet connected storage - remote servers, off site backups, repositories and that nebulous concept of "the cloud".Software has evolved to blur the edges, so that we can refer to a file on our own hard drive or somewhere in the cloud with pretty much the same ease. For those who are not tech savvy, this makes using computing devices so much easier - as long as they follow the corporate guidelines and trust those who set them up. They no longer NEED to understand any detail in order to use those resources - so why would they even try? When the magic saviour of data - aka "syncing" - that makes the loss of a physical device inconsequential (other than the purchase cost of a replacement) is added into the mix, many will just give control of their data over to the corporate beast without considering the implications - not just because it's easier, but because they don't have the skills to understand anything more than the marketing spiel. The "trust" issue is dismissed in the direction of "If they screw up, they'll get sued".The evolution of the motor vehicle is a perfect parallel. When they first appeared, you would not only need to know how to drive it, you would need to know how to fault find and fix it. These days, that is no longer the case ... and, in fact, manufacturers are now adding systems that make it more and more difficult, if not impossible, to fix vehicles.Why would kids "never stop to consider where the data go"...? It's very simple. They don'tneedto.

author: CJay
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 03, 2021, 09:26:11 am
content: Quote from: james_s on October 02, 2021, 07:27:17 pmWhich the vast majority of older users will have been doing at some point because POP3 was what was recommended to the vast majority of internet users.It's still in widespread use to this day.Quote from: james_s on October 02, 2021, 07:27:17 pmJust because *you* do something a certain way doesn't mean everyone else does it the same way, it doesn't mean it's the right way, it's just the way *you* do it.And again, as you say, IMAP can delete mail from a server, so 'can you transfer my emails' is a valid question.Pretty much nobody will have uploaded all their downloaded old emails back onto a mail server so, again, if you have old email archives, it's a valid question.FYI, been 'doing email' since Netware 3.12 in the early 90s, have been around the block more than a few times with this

author: tooki
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 03, 2021, 10:10:25 am
content: Quote from: james_s on October 02, 2021, 07:38:23 pmYeah I know the history. My comment was making fun of how literally nobody uses the new units.Quote from: james_s on October 02, 2021, 07:38:23 pmHave you ever seen anyone argue this, outside of storage vendors?

author: m98
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: October 03, 2021, 11:16:21 am
content: Quote from: james_s on October 02, 2021, 07:38:23 pmWho cares about Microsoft or JEDEC? "Kilo" is a SI prefix that strictly refers to powers of 10. If you want powers of 2, use the IEC/ISO standard. There is no need to upkeep this artificial ambiguity.

author: magic
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 03, 2021, 11:18:06 am
content: Quote from: tooki on October 03, 2021, 10:10:25 amYes, there is a whole thread about it somewhere. Indeed, we have just triggered one metric fanboyAnd not just storage vendors, certain OS that shall remain nameless also adopted those units years ago so that disks appear to have more capacity than on Windows

author: tooki
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 03, 2021, 11:33:34 am
content: Quote from: magic on October 03, 2021, 11:18:06 amI thought it was simply to agree with the storage shown on the packaging. Silly either way. :/

author: Echo88
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: October 03, 2021, 12:54:40 pm
content: When not using a file structure, how do you then find the necessary files of interest for a certain topic/project?Lets say you want to design a digital resistance measurement bridge then usually the respective file folder on my pc would fill with relevant papers/manuals/appnotes, simulations, CAD-schematics/layouts, text documents for notes/change logs and pictures of scope traces or pcbs during the design.How is that managed by someone that doesnt understand/use file structures?Do they add tags for everything to make a searchfeature actually usable?

author: Karel
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 03, 2021, 03:04:11 pm
content: Quote from: Echo88 on October 03, 2021, 12:54:40 pmYou'll have to install an "app" for that

author: tunk
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 03, 2021, 03:10:08 pm
content: I would guess that most companies have some guidelines forstorage, and that this includes some filing/directory structure.

author: Miyuki
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: October 03, 2021, 04:32:18 pm
content: Quote from: Echo88 on October 03, 2021, 12:54:40 pmWhen you work on just one or two projects, you have it as recently used filesNo need for complicated organization

author: Echo88
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: October 03, 2021, 11:12:26 pm
content: "Hey, we need a new revision for that pcb you did a year ago" "Sure thing, lets me just search a few hours for files that roughly fit the design date"

author: Alex Eisenhut
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 03, 2021, 11:26:42 pm
content: Bah. Kids these days are also not familiar with the idea of "real-time recording", that is to say that back then if you wanted a 3 minute song, it took 3 minutes to record it to your tape or whatever.

author: Kasper
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: October 04, 2021, 05:44:54 am
content: Quote from: xrunner on September 30, 2021, 02:07:54 pmDid they say "why did you 3D print the save icon?"?

author: xrunner
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 04, 2021, 11:10:52 am
content: Quote from: Kasper on October 04, 2021, 05:44:54 amLOL no. They don't care about 3D printing at all. I've had them over to show it off and it's a big meh. Across the street I just began talking to the woman's new husband last week, because we've never met due to the virus stuff. Well he had a nice Ender 5 plus in the garage so we have something in common. But I asked him if any of the three boys living there were into it. Nope - don't care. I wonder if that's the case with many kids?As far as the actual save icon, in theory it could be anything as long as the person using the software knew it from the other icons. What's the modern equivalent of the floppy icon - a little cloud. Or it could just actually say "SAVE" ...

author: tszaboo
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 04, 2021, 11:38:01 am
content: I had Programming 101 at university. It was teaching C, embedded focus. The professor told us:-Whoever doesn't speak English, has one week to learn it. If you don't know how to use windows, give up now, goodbye, you will never be an engineer. At least not while I still teach here.And I agree with him. People who have no basic understanding how to operate a computer shouldn't get any kind of degree.

author: Kasper
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: October 04, 2021, 05:13:56 pm
content: Quote from: xrunner on October 04, 2021, 11:10:52 amPretty advanced neighborhood you're in there. In mine we mostly talk about gardening and home renos.I fear manual saving might also become a forgotten skill. I was amazed in uni when people would lose a bunch of work because they didn't save. When I taught a KiCAD tutorial I started with having them save and organize the files.

author: xrunner
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 04, 2021, 07:21:08 pm
content: Quote from: Kasper on October 04, 2021, 05:13:56 pmOh no, nope. The guy across the street having a 3D printing hobby is pure luck. If you met the other neighbors you would realize there is nowhere near an advanced group living in this 'hood.

author: MrMobodies
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 04, 2021, 07:44:20 pm
content: Quote from: Kasper on October 04, 2021, 05:13:56 pmTen years ago I knew of someone who did the right thing and they made sure they saved their work but the problem was that they saved it all on a pendrive as a primary means of storage.It had 4 years of university work on it.He started to notice when a few of the files were not opening.I found only about half was recoverable no matter what I did.It was a LG 4GB pen drive I think but after that upon testing it would intermittently pass and fail and on fail it seems that things would get overwritten.