Comments on: Structure vs Metadata

By: David Buttrick

David Buttrick — Sun, 04 Feb 2007 23:08:19 +0000

Have you guys downloaded, and played with xattr at all?

It looks as though apple is planning some kind of silver lined future, as they have worked extended attributes into the OS. The implementation is at the BSD level tho, and there’s no Coacoa API, yet… Which means that you cant put xattrs on a file, and index them with Spotlight.

I bet 10.5 will implement this.

By: Raz

Raz — Thu, 09 Feb 2006 18:36:38 +0000

Really….many thanks, I’ve been aimlessly looking for advice in these kind of topic for many months and finally I’ve found it here…

About the iTunes obsession, yes…it can be very stressing indeed not to have everything neat….like Nick said, “I want my computer to do everything for me”, so it’s worth the effort

By: Jamie

Jamie — Thu, 09 Feb 2006 18:26:37 +0000

Whoa. Dont get me started on my unhealthy iTunes metadata infactuation. I get mad even if I have a track with no genre.

By: Nick Santilli

Nick Santilli — Thu, 09 Feb 2006 18:26:35 +0000

Raz - check it As for iTunes, take a look at this: TuneTag If you use Quicksilver, this is a KILLER script set for tagging the crap out of your music on the fly!

By: Raz

Raz — Thu, 09 Feb 2006 17:49:19 +0000

“glad you’ve found ‘the mother ship”

:D thanks, my sanity was being questioned with my friends who were starting to think I’d end up naked in some bacteria-free room washing my hands every 5 minutes (mmmmmmm that I do)

Looking forward to your post…I’ll make use of it also for iTunes (another obsession)

By: Nick Santilli

Nick Santilli — Thu, 09 Feb 2006 17:43:29 +0000

Raz – your questions merit more than a ‘comments’ response. I’m going to post a little piece shortly (I’ll link it after the fact, from here in the comments).

glad you’ve found ‘the mother ship’. :D

By: Raz

Raz — Thu, 09 Feb 2006 17:32:41 +0000

I’m still impressed to find guys obsessed with this kind of stuff like myself….I’m listengn guys, your idea of a metatag experiment was something I thought was a fact that I was going insane but I’ve found a place to discuss these kind of topics.

I will attempt a similar experiment on my new iMac (it gives me a fresh and easier start than my old powerbook), the only questions for me always has been:

How do you choose how many tags you will handle ??
How do you keep the tag number under control?
As an organization freak I always tend to lose perception and eventually end up a mess

Thanks guys

By: Sid Barcelona

Sid Barcelona — Wed, 11 Jan 2006 05:18:44 +0000

Apple has done a great job over the years to evolve its computer hardware. Unfortunately the Mac GUI has not evolved at the same rate. We are still living in a world of windows/folders/icons and I think we all have been experiencing the limitations of this method in organizing the amount of information we are managing on a daily basis. Metadata could be a way to go, but we need a new OS/GUI that incorporates this method from its core and not as an add on to the existing MacOS. If this were the case, application developers could take advantage of this method and we could really take things to a new level. I long for a new ‘insanely great’ user experience that moves beyond ‘cutesy’ icons and a hierarchical file structure. I wish that Apple would stop giving us ‘widgets’ which are the software equivalent of ‘sound bite’ information and focus on real user experience issues. In the future we are guaranteed that we will have to deal with even more data, so we need new methods/systems that will enable us to easily create/organize/access information more efficiently. I hope that we can encourage Apple to evolve its OS and create the next generation user experience.

By: Jamie

Jamie — Tue, 10 Jan 2006 15:13:52 +0000

It appears Vista is not just incorporating it into all save dialogues. They have a bar thats prevalent at the bottom of EVERY explorer window where you can add the metadata.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/7/70/Windows_Vista_%28screenshot2%29.jpg/800px-Windows_Vista_%28screenshot2%29.jpg

By: Nick Santilli

Nick Santilli — Tue, 10 Jan 2006 15:10:42 +0000

Well following the fantastic comments to add a tagging field to the save dialogs, I shot off an email. Default Folder X does a lot to enhance the save dialogs in OS X. So I sent of an email with your ideas to the developer. He responded that it's already on his list of enhancements for a future release. So if we don't hear about it as a part of Leopard today, we can at least look toward Default Folder X to fit the bill!