Path: utzoo!utgpu!watserv1!watmath!att!cbnewsm!mls
From: mls@cbnewsm.ATT.COM (mike.siemon)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac
Subject: Re: Text file madness: diagnosis & prescription.
Summary: the "real" issue
Message-ID: <8322@cbnewsm.ATT.COM>
Date: 7 Jan 90 00:17:26 GMT
References: <2706@aecom.yu.edu> <5900@ncar.ucar.edu> <1998@eric.mpr.ca> <9505@spool.cs.wisc.edu>
Distribution: na
Organization: AT&T Bell Laboratories
Lines: 49

In article <9505@spool.cs.wisc.edu>, tonyrich@titanic.cs.wisc.edu (Anthony Rich) writes:
> In article <8315@cbnewsm.ATT.COM> mls@cbnewsm.ATT.COM (mike.siemon) writes:

> >The example of reading an arbitrary file is just that, an example of a
> >much larger general problem.  If I have a file I may want to use it in
> >a number of different ways, totally unconstrained by the file's origin
> >or by my intentions when I create the file.

> We seem to have another religious war heating up here.  This real issue
> seems to be "Should operating systems do typechecking (between files and
> applications?)"

Well, actually, no.  I cancelled my original article, because it was a bit
flamish and not terribly helpful about "what to do."  It seems to have got
out to a few sites anyway, so maybe I should add some justification.

The "problem" is that we are *always* generating data for some purpose or
other (on paper or in variously formatted files) and then we discover that
we'd like to *do* something with this data.  If the purpose *precedes* the
generation of the data, then one can imagine a Mac-like interface working
very well -- simply create the data in the ultimately desired format, or
generate it and then immediately go into the "destination" utility and set
things up for further use there.

But the fact is the

	- we *don't* always know at the outset how we are going to use data

	- we often think of new things to do with our data *after* it has
	  been created.

Again, I need to emphasize that there is *no problem* with the Mac interface
in dealing with such things on a custom basis.  One simply follows through
with the particular data until it has reached its proper destination.  But
the larger issue is the *reuse* of data, and the use of data for purposes 
beyond those that generated it in the first place.  Human intelligence is a
very open-ended thing, and one of its principle characteristics is a sort of
self-reference.  Once we *have* something, we immediately proceed to use it
in a way different from the way in which we first conceived it.  The power
of abstraction and reuse is so vital to human thought that it really *should*
be built into any computer system that attempts to respond to NEW thinking.

The Mac is fine, as long as you *only* do what someone else wants you to do
with it.
-- 
Michael L. Siemon		I say "You are gods, sons of the
cucard!dasys1!mls		Most High, all of you; nevertheless
att!sfbat!mls			you shall die like men, and fall
standard disclaimer		like any prince."   Psalm 82:6-7