- Episode AI notes
- Conservatism in demos is important for broader appeal, using familiar concepts like tabs can attract a larger audience
TabFS aims to modernize the concept ‘everything is a file’ by translating modern computer concepts into files Time 0:00:00
Conservatism in Demos for Broader Appeal The speaker highlights the importance of conservatism in demos for broader appeal, citing the example of utilizing familiar concepts like tabs in browsers for extensions to make the presentation more accessible. By starting with simple and recognizable features, the presenter can attract a larger audience, gradually introducing more cutting-edge ideas over time. Employing familiar interfaces can make the demo more compelling to a wider public, as demonstrated by the speaker’s decision not to use SQL in a demo but rather focus on file interfaces, which more people are likely to understand and engage with.
Speaker 1
I guess is just the most concrete thing in your browser and so that got promoted to be the title. Maybe part of it is also the browser extension API’s. If you go look at the Chrome extension API, the tab APIs are like pretty prominently placed and it’s easy to understand what they do. So those are some of the first examples that I started writing. And so maybe that kind of accidentally dominated the presentation of the extension.
Speaker 2
Right. And then it is a common thing for people to say they have thousands of tabs open and there are extensions that help you with that. Right.
Speaker 1
So maybe it’s unintentionally a good presentation. I think when you have a demo like this, like there’s a lot of usefulness in being kind of conservative in what the demo does where it’s like something that people recognize as something Useful. I was thinking about this because I was looking at some of the comments. Some people were like, well, why doesn’t it use SQL or why didn’t you come up with some more radical concept than just turning into files or files are a limited interface. And I honestly think that I could have made it like a SQLite thing or whatever, but I think if I’d done that, it would have gotten much less uptake because I think fewer people know SQL in Some sense. The conservatism is part of why the demo is so compelling to a broader public and then over time, hopefully I can nudge people towards something a little bit more cutting edge.
Speaker 2
Yeah. Even going back to our other conversations about spatial stuff, being able to see that it’s in Finder, I think that’s a lot cooler than saying it’s a SQL database.Modernizing concepts into files The project aims to modernize the concept ‘everything is a file,’ originally from UNIX, by translating modern computer concepts into files. This move is about taking a historical mantra seriously and reevaluating it in current contexts. The speaker points out that while people often mention ‘everything is a file,’ they don’t truly consider it when dealing with various digital elements like browser tabs, social media posts, or processes. By viewing contemporary computer elements as files, the project seeks to revisit and reinterpret traditional ideas like tradition and ritual in a modern light.
Speaker 1
Yeah, I think that this is taking some of the ideas and trying to to modernize them. Well, I mean, everything is a file that’s a phrase that goes back to the original UNIX today, even if you take like an operating systems class, like I T8 operating systems and college Stanford, like everything is file is something that people sort of just like mumble. It’s like part of history. It’s like part of why UNIX one, it’s not something that I think people actually like often really take seriously as like, oh, I have all this stuff on my computer. I have all these browser tabs. How can they be files? And so part of the kind of deep drive of this project is to actually take that mantra seriously and like modern concepts on your computer into files.
Speaker 2
Okay, it’s something that people tell each other, but nothing in our systems actually reflect that statement.
Speaker 1
Like no new concepts. I mean, yeah, like your UNIX processes are files and your sockets are kind of like files, but you know, your Twitter users are not files posts on your Facebook feed or files. And I think pushing for more of that, I mean, it’s kind of like what we talked about with regard to freshness and scripture in the last podcast is like taking these ideas that people now Just kind of mouth and really reevaluating them and reapplying them.
Speaker 2
You mean like tradition and ritual that people have lost the reason why they do it and they need to revisit that and reinterpret that in the current time.
