On Sat, May 26, 2012 at 10:44:15AM +0200, Camillo Bruni wrote: > > On 2012-05-26, at 06:41, David T. Lewis wrote: > > > What is a "working directory"? And for that matter, what is a "directory"? > > These are concepts and metaphors that have been used in various ways by > > some (but not all) operating systems, and that do not automatically have > > a well defined meaning independent of those metaphors and operating systems. > > There is really no such thing as "current working directory" in > > Squeak/Pharo, > > so if you want to create such a concept you are free to do so in any way > > you please. > > well on all unix there is a very clear precise definition of it "getcwd()"! > and on all decent platforms there's a more or less clear notion of > what is a file and what is a directory? > > Talking about Pharo, which platforms do we target? > - Linux > - OS X > - Win
You're right about that of course. I guess I just like to remind people that unix is not the only good operating system that has ever been invented, and that ideas like "files" are just part of a metaphor that was invented decades ago to help people relate their computer to something they already understood (a physical desk with a desktop and with file cabinets filled with folders that contained paper documents). With cell phones, tablets, and solid state storage it is quite possible that the ancient "desk with file cabinet" metaphors will become obsolete, so it is good to keep an open mind. > > maybe I am wrong, but I think we could assume a common denominator here? > (Using python and ruby yields to the same results AFAIK) I don't know. But OS X may well be an example of an environment that presents a file system view to the user that is different from the file system view at the unix file system or unix shell level. And Windows 7 appears to be trying to imitate OS X in that regard. If you implement a concept of "current working directory" in the image, you are free to define it in whatever way makes good sense. But there is no fundamental reason why you need to use a definition that matches the unix file system view (as reported by OSProcess). You might instead prefer to use a definition that matches what the OS X user expects to see in the finder, and maybe that is a different thing (I am not an OS X user, so apologies if I am getting this wrong). Dave
