Folders are slowly going away Over the past decade or so, and more noticeably in the past few years, younger users are ignoring the concepts of “files” and “folders” when it comes to saving their work on a computer. A recent article in The Verge dug into this, and an early example in the article sums it up well. When helping students track down their files, it led to an interesting exchange:
I read about this too ( Folders are for Boomers - https://twitter.com/simonw/status/1440725351949213700 ) and wondered if I should change my ways. I have been a file/folder user since I learned how to program COBOL on an IBM mainframe (def a Boomer here!) I've noticed that I have to work a bit harder to view the Folders structure using Windows and I do usually use Search to find things.And I'm using Roam much more frequently! (I actually found that ref above in my Roam!!)
Is this a possible reason why folders/files are still relevant:
I recently went through the process of transitioning to a new laptop and my biggest concerns were making sure I didn't leave any files "behind" on the previous laptop AND that everything was backed up or synced to the cloud.
I don't know how to do that without working with folders/files.... am I missing something?
That's a good question. I think it's less about files and folders, and more about cloud vs local. For a growing number of people (like those in the article), they just don't have many local files. Everything is in Google Drive, or Roam, or Notion, or Apple Notes or whatever.
I'm largely in this group, where I have virtually no files on my computer. Those are do have are in Dropbox and Drive (in well-organized folders), but changing computers is no big deal.
The whole file/folder discussion aside, making everything sync through the cloud is wonderful and makes it super easy to jump between computers -- I'm often on three different computers in any given day (home desktop, work desktop, laptop, and then sometimes my standing desk with a different laptop) and everything just follows me around automatically. It's pretty comforting.
I read about this too ( Folders are for Boomers - https://twitter.com/simonw/status/1440725351949213700 ) and wondered if I should change my ways. I have been a file/folder user since I learned how to program COBOL on an IBM mainframe (def a Boomer here!) I've noticed that I have to work a bit harder to view the Folders structure using Windows and I do usually use Search to find things.And I'm using Roam much more frequently! (I actually found that ref above in my Roam!!)
Is this a possible reason why folders/files are still relevant:
I recently went through the process of transitioning to a new laptop and my biggest concerns were making sure I didn't leave any files "behind" on the previous laptop AND that everything was backed up or synced to the cloud.
I don't know how to do that without working with folders/files.... am I missing something?
That's a good question. I think it's less about files and folders, and more about cloud vs local. For a growing number of people (like those in the article), they just don't have many local files. Everything is in Google Drive, or Roam, or Notion, or Apple Notes or whatever.
I'm largely in this group, where I have virtually no files on my computer. Those are do have are in Dropbox and Drive (in well-organized folders), but changing computers is no big deal.
The whole file/folder discussion aside, making everything sync through the cloud is wonderful and makes it super easy to jump between computers -- I'm often on three different computers in any given day (home desktop, work desktop, laptop, and then sometimes my standing desk with a different laptop) and everything just follows me around automatically. It's pretty comforting.