Do you think better AI will change the way we store files? Meaning basically, right now you make specific folders and ideally nest them so you can locate stuff. But maybe in the future everything just goes in a bin and you say "hey AI, get me that one file about the thing"
@peteriskrisjanis@ZachWeinersmith I could see an llm being able to make qualitative evaluations of files without me having to exhaustively tag my file system with metadata. I have something like several hundred D&D Adventures but as far as Windows File Explorer is concerned they're all simply PDFs, just like my resumes. I do think recent AI tech is closer to letting me just ask "find me my d&d adventures featuring a criminal antagonist and a magic item that grants flight."
@dwgill@ZachWeinersmith that is called indexing and Tracker for example does that (I think Finder did that as well, but I haven't used MacOS for untold years).
@peteriskrisjanis@ZachWeinersmith where did I say we needed LLMs? With computer science virtually any desired behavior has a multitude of potential implementations. I wouldn't doubt something approximating the behavior I'm describing exists, but it's obviously not commoditized or else it would be in every file explorer on the planet already. I'm simply excited to see where LLMs tech goes in this realm of interrogating your own data, because I think that's been under invested in historically
@dwgill@peteriskrisjanis For me, where AI comes in would be things that require me to do more than find filetypes or filenames e.g. "can you get me any comics I drew that have aliens in them." In principle I should've saved them and tagged them properly knowing that one day I'd do an alien book, but...
@ZachWeinersmith
probably, but only you give the corporation acceee to all your files and the right to use them for training (and maybe advertising)... @dwgill@peteriskrisjanis
@ZachWeinersmith@peteriskrisjanis non textual files are an even better example of these kinds of qualitative assessments that I think contemporary AI is on the precipice of being able to make. And with searching local data for files that either exist or don't, the stakes are far lower than ChatGPT being abused as the world's worst encyclopedia and propagating conspiracy theories etc.
@ZachWeinersmith I sort of already do it with everything 😅. But it relies on filenames. Content aware search would be the only ai feature I might like in an OS.
@ZachWeinersmith it’s called “search” and already exists. Go into your Google or Apple photos and text search for an object and you’ll find photos with that in.
Some computer science university teachers complain they already get students who have no idea what files or directories are as their phones just have search.
@ZachWeinersmith
There have been quite a few research-y attempts to make this happen. It's a nice idea but it's really difficult to figure out what the significance of old files is, even for people. The files themselves often don't have enough metadata to go from, so you end up doing stuff like capturing a bunch of user activity data in the hope that you'll be able to use that to facilitate retrieval later ('you made this file after reading an email where Bob asked for sales numbers')
@ZachWeinersmith I remember reading that undergrads were already entering science degree programs without being familiar with directory structures due to a childhood spent with cloud storage augmented with perfectly cached searches; so presumably we're already at that point
There was some research (that, ironically, I can't find right now) that basically said only us Old Computers People think in terms of files/folders now, and it's largely a result of phones becoming most people's primary computing devices. phones largely lack a view on a filing system and most people have an app-first mentality, searching within apps to find the thing they were working on.
@ZachWeinersmith designers have been trying this approach since virtual folders in windows vista. Android hides the filesystem from the user, apps only display APIs like "here's a list of pictures in this phone". Chrome dumps everything in a Downloads folder. Both XDG desktop and Windows embrace this approach. It was not AI, it was just 'search', but basically the last ten years of UX design have been "dump everything in a bin and let the finder retrieve it"
@ZachWeinersmith Desktop Search Engines have been a thing for quite a while but outside of niche interest never gained much traction. I don't know if "AI" will solve that. Maybe if Microsoft integrates it into Windows. But then that search engine will still basically only search the Desktop folder because that's where people put their stuff ;)
@ZachWeinersmith I don't know. The technology to do much better/friendlier filing paradigms has existed for a long time now. I feel like the transition from "hierarchically structured archive" to "bucket with keyword search" (which modern operating systems readily offer) is generational more than technological. I know I'm never giving up my folders, I like when things stay where I left them. But I'm also reaching the "IT dinosaur" stage of my life. 😄
@ZachWeinersmith Pretty sure that's how most people work now anyway -- I know I use my disk search function WAY more than ever before and my file system structure is much shallower because of it.
Folders are just a form of manual indexing and ML like the way Google Photos let’s you search for things like “Kid a at the cottage” and “front yard” has made me completely stop sorting photos. Seriously it’s magic. It’s worked like this for years, before the AI craze. I can even look up “Television reciept.”
@ZachWeinersmith it's like how my Dad used to ask to be passed things at the dining table when the words escaped him. Salt, or beans or whatever. We'd play dumb until he started to get mad. Strangely we knew exactly what he wanted, and he knew we did.
@ZachWeinersmith
AI: Do you mean One of twenty identically named files with equally gibberish-filled descriptions
Me: Uh... Yes? The smart house lights turn off
@ZachWeinersmith You know those posts where someone goes "I have a song in my head that goes 'nah nah, do re doooh' can anyone help?" and then like, a dozen people go "it's this rare Eagles B-side". That, but for file search.
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