3D-Finder (beta) out!
- Thread starter Zammy-Sam
- Start date
This is an old idea: organizing the files like appartements in a town, with streets, houses, floors... and navigate it in 3-D.
This helps by giving faster access to more files.
This does not solve another (and today more important) problem: how to maintain several different file organizations in the same time on the same computer (organize by date to see what I did yesterday, by project to keep all data relative to one customer together, by type to find my images fast...). Indeed what is needed is not another file system, it's a much better viewer.
This helps by giving faster access to more files.
This does not solve another (and today more important) problem: how to maintain several different file organizations in the same time on the same computer (organize by date to see what I did yesterday, by project to keep all data relative to one customer together, by type to find my images fast...). Indeed what is needed is not another file system, it's a much better viewer.
ora
Registered
Interesting to see this. i've heard about 3d systems and seen a few video demos (i think from Sun) but haven't been able to use one before. It links in with my dissertation (on the desktop paradigm for UI) since it is on one hand a step forward and on the other is just an extension of previous UI concepts.
I think we need to try stepping away from the dominant desktop/file/folder system, if only to better understand the limitations that it puts on us.
Chevy's point on having multiple ways to look at things is also very interesting. As he says, a new viewer is important. on possibility is to go for a search-based finder/viewer. By auto content-indexing and using easily searchable identifiers for projects, file types etc searching could become the standard way of finding files rather than moving through the filesystem to where you saved a file.
I think we need to try stepping away from the dominant desktop/file/folder system, if only to better understand the limitations that it puts on us.
Chevy's point on having multiple ways to look at things is also very interesting. As he says, a new viewer is important. on possibility is to go for a search-based finder/viewer. By auto content-indexing and using easily searchable identifiers for projects, file types etc searching could become the standard way of finding files rather than moving through the filesystem to where you saved a file.
michaelsanford
Translator, Web Developer
Randman I have to agree with you, the idea of a 3D Finder looks, to me, horrible.
Maybe when holographics become the standard display system it'll be more useful, otherwise this display is just a gimmick.
Maybe when holographics become the standard display system it'll be more useful, otherwise this display is just a gimmick.
Well, the industry seems to agree that we'll move away from the desktop paradigm in that we (users) don't have to remember exactly where we put something earlier. We just have to remember 'things' (metadata) about them. This, luckily, should happen automatically once we're actually using a system (Tiger) that indexes stuff for us in the background.
A three-dimensional view on data, however, can be applied on _top_ of such a system. This beta certainly is not a replacement for today's Finder. And it's not intended as such. However, done the right way, a three-dimensional desktop could definitely add to the desktop experience...
Also: I think we'd have to actually try and use any new paradigm in handling files for at least a week before we can definitely say what works and what does not.
Right now I'm thinking that the third dimension (near/far) on today's Mac desktop could be used to show me information on when I last used something. Files on the desktop I haven't used for, say, two days, could be further away than the ones I've most recently used. If I haven't used a file for over a week, it could vanish from the desktop (but still be available through the normal file structure and, of course, a metadata-based search engine).
A three-dimensional view on data, however, can be applied on _top_ of such a system. This beta certainly is not a replacement for today's Finder. And it's not intended as such. However, done the right way, a three-dimensional desktop could definitely add to the desktop experience...
Also: I think we'd have to actually try and use any new paradigm in handling files for at least a week before we can definitely say what works and what does not.
Right now I'm thinking that the third dimension (near/far) on today's Mac desktop could be used to show me information on when I last used something. Files on the desktop I haven't used for, say, two days, could be further away than the ones I've most recently used. If I haven't used a file for over a week, it could vanish from the desktop (but still be available through the normal file structure and, of course, a metadata-based search engine).
ora
Registered
Fair enough. I haven't had a go with the tiger preview yet (too deep in other work), but i'll be interested to see how much people use it. As in- will it in general be quicker to use spotlight than traditionally navigate to things or use sidebar shortcuts etc ?Randman said:
Fryke said:
I totally agree! We are so ties to the current interface paradigm that new ideas look clumsy to us. Its not that they are necessarily slower/more complicated, but they don't rest on the long term habituation we have with desktop UIs.
Apple, with the OSX variants, have been great at integrating new things into the current paradigm, but to really see what it would be like we need to see a totally different UI, and that is obviously not a very commercial move for a company like Apple to make.
At first I hated the 3D thing, but that was based on knee-jerk reaction. I'm not going to DL it to test as I don't want to install any unnecessary apps, but it looks at least worth playing around with.
My personal work arounds for navigation have been to create keyboard shortcuts with iKey (e.g. Control+D is my documents folder). Occasionally these shortcuts interfere with application-native shortcuts (FCP/Maya), but for the most part they work across the board. Additionally, I think voice control is woefully underused. I used to set up voice control sequences to launch frequently used files, but the recognition was so finicky that it ended up being more frustrating than useful. I still think that's a whole untapped approach.
I think Metadata navigation is going to be good and bad. Too much Metadata is going to give us the Google effect, where you end up with a gazillion files and you only need a specific one. Now Spotlight's filters will work around that to some extent, but it will be interesting to see it in action, if it gets too out of control for some of us.
On some level we still need to organize things logically/hierarchically for a variety of reasons. Many apps require proper relative pathing for file access (web design/page layout/video editing and more). And for archival, it's a lot easier to just burn a folder than trying to do some kind of metadata search for all related files for a given project. Course, soon as I say that, there's no reason a metadata tag couldn't be "Project Name", thereby mitigating my argument a bit.
In the end, I agree it seems like there could be a "better way", but I certainly don't know what it is. I think it would be fun as hell to develop a vaporware GUI. I had started one a while back that was based on the idea of anal-retentive cleanliness. There were no icons or menus visible on the screen. You had to drag to and screen area top, bottom, or either side and menus would pop out like the Dock does now. Kind of like how InDesign CS's new side pallettes work, except completely hidden until you roll over to that area. Not very well thought out, but it was clean!
My personal work arounds for navigation have been to create keyboard shortcuts with iKey (e.g. Control+D is my documents folder). Occasionally these shortcuts interfere with application-native shortcuts (FCP/Maya), but for the most part they work across the board. Additionally, I think voice control is woefully underused. I used to set up voice control sequences to launch frequently used files, but the recognition was so finicky that it ended up being more frustrating than useful. I still think that's a whole untapped approach.
I think Metadata navigation is going to be good and bad. Too much Metadata is going to give us the Google effect, where you end up with a gazillion files and you only need a specific one. Now Spotlight's filters will work around that to some extent, but it will be interesting to see it in action, if it gets too out of control for some of us.
On some level we still need to organize things logically/hierarchically for a variety of reasons. Many apps require proper relative pathing for file access (web design/page layout/video editing and more). And for archival, it's a lot easier to just burn a folder than trying to do some kind of metadata search for all related files for a given project. Course, soon as I say that, there's no reason a metadata tag couldn't be "Project Name", thereby mitigating my argument a bit.
In the end, I agree it seems like there could be a "better way", but I certainly don't know what it is. I think it would be fun as hell to develop a vaporware GUI. I had started one a while back that was based on the idea of anal-retentive cleanliness. There were no icons or menus visible on the screen. You had to drag to and screen area top, bottom, or either side and menus would pop out like the Dock does now. Kind of like how InDesign CS's new side pallettes work, except completely hidden until you roll over to that area. Not very well thought out, but it was clean!
Pippin
Sys***** slave.
I agree this is a very old idea, and serves almost no purpose on todays operating systems such as panther and soon tiger. However it is nice to see what else is possible as in time we will have to move away from the standard layout systems that we use today. 3d + voice commands would be nice, but I am sure this already exists in a lab somewhere.gollum84 said:
Sometime we will need a change.
texanpenguin
Registered Penguin
On my PC, I had such environments (that were, admittedly, MUCH better at what they did). They were bulky to use, but weren't impossible. Sun's Looking Glass project is about as "three-dimensional" as I'd ever like to see an OS get. Longhorn's Direct-X based demoes are almost identical to my eye.
As for Spotlight, and whether or not it'll change the way we operate - you all HAVE to be using LaunchBar these days - it's RADICALLY increased my productivity since I began to use it a few months ago. Not so good for files you haven't explicitly told it to reference, but it's insanely good at giving me Addresses and Applications all over the place. I like that it recognises that Share My Desktop is found with SMD. I like that it remembers what I last did. I love this program. If Tiger accomplishes it half as well as LaunchBar does, it'll be the best new feature.
As for Spotlight, and whether or not it'll change the way we operate - you all HAVE to be using LaunchBar these days - it's RADICALLY increased my productivity since I began to use it a few months ago. Not so good for files you haven't explicitly told it to reference, but it's insanely good at giving me Addresses and Applications all over the place. I like that it recognises that Share My Desktop is found with SMD. I like that it remembers what I last did. I love this program. If Tiger accomplishes it half as well as LaunchBar does, it'll be the best new feature.
Cat
Registered
The visuals are great, but the organisation of the files is still exactly the same. Now files and folders are structured like tree, a 2D pyramid. All these purportedly 3D files managers just turn the flat pyramid into a real one or a cone, without essentially changing anything about the way you navigate the files. It's just a fancy way of adding perspective to column browsing ... *shrug* ...
What would be nice, is when they really would change the basic organisation of the files, adding a true extra dimension, such as time: you can browse into the "depth" seeing the various drafts and revisions of your document, the history of your file, possibly with graphically rendered growth statistics, representing size etc.
Another option would be to interactively link several files together: documents and projects which you always have opened together could be represented with links to one another, creating a more logical organisation of the data on your HD. The OS could also anticipate that you are going to need certain files based on usage statistics and patterns. This would make for a more "organic" desktop environment.
What would be nice, is when they really would change the basic organisation of the files, adding a true extra dimension, such as time: you can browse into the "depth" seeing the various drafts and revisions of your document, the history of your file, possibly with graphically rendered growth statistics, representing size etc.
Another option would be to interactively link several files together: documents and projects which you always have opened together could be represented with links to one another, creating a more logical organisation of the data on your HD. The OS could also anticipate that you are going to need certain files based on usage statistics and patterns. This would make for a more "organic" desktop environment.