<div class="gmail_quote">On Thu, Feb 4, 2010 at 4:34 PM, Nathan Eisenberg <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:nathan@atlasnetworks.us">nathan@atlasnetworks.us</a>></span> wrote:<br><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex;">
<div class="im">> Users expect a / directory in a filesystem. Tahoe isn't a filesystem, but it does things a filesystem does (store and<br>
> retrieve files). They expect to interact with it like a filesystem because they see it as a filesystem.<br>
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</div>That would seem to conflict with the expectation set by the name 'Least Authority File System'.<br>
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Understand, I'm not being catty at all - I'm just saying that if this expectation conflict is confusing to me (and I've spent weeks reading wikis and mailing list history and experimenting with test grids), it will probably be confusing for others as well.<br>
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Best Regards,<br>
<font color="#888888">Nathan Eisenberg<br>
</font><div><div></div><div class="h5"></div></div></blockquote></div><br><div>Nathan, I'm beginning to see the problem.</div><div><br></div><div>Basically it boils down to this:</div><div><br></div><div>The "average user" will attempt to interact with Tahoe-LAFS in a way that violates the design parameters of Tahoe-LAFS.</div>
<div><br></div><div>The only way to "fix" this "bug" will be to break the "LAFS" part of Tahoe-LAFS.</div><div><br></div><div>Perhaps a "independent subsidiary" project would break LAFS by creating a metaphor allowing users to interact with Tahoe as a filesystem.</div>
<div><br></div><div>I do not have the understanding to undertake such a project, and I shudder at the prospects of gaining that understanding....</div><div><br></div><div>I remember being surprised when I first realized that a child directory did not have a '.' link back to it's parent. That was when I began to realize that Tahoe-LAFS is not a filesystem. There was a "hey, this is a bug moment," followed by an, "oh, yeah," moment.</div>
<div><br></div><div>I can't wait around for Octavia to materialize, and I don't want my Tahoe grid to fracture by defection. I'm stuck between two worlds....</div>