One opinion, repeated a zillion times, does not make an argument; it makes a rant.
I see only a few arguments in this text:
- the author does not think nested hierarchies are difficult. If he added "for nerds", I would agree with him.
- the author equates having limited nesting with the 'data silos' situation on iOS and (from what I read in reviews), in slightly lesser sense on Mac OS X Mountain Lion.
- claiming that the mouse is hard to use because it provides "indirect manipulation". That may seem so, but the human brain is exceptionally good at transferring motor skills between modalities. For example, anybody who can write can write with his feet, nose, car, or whatever, and the handwriting will (except for the quality of fine motor skills) be recognizable as yours (http://www.ebaumsworld.com/jokes/read/211551/)
- equating having limited nesting with vendor lock-in. Proprietary file formats are fine for doing that. I do not see why you would need to do anything more.
"the author does not think nested hierarchies are difficult. If he added "for nerds", I would agree with him."
Imagine you badly need to go to the bathroom, and the only building nearby is a huge hospital... will all the complexity hidden away in the various sections, rooms, and the patients themselves, delay your quest for the toilet even one second?
Also, the brain can only keep a bunch of things in mind at a time,no matter how they're presented. When complexity crosses the threshold, we group stuff together. And we also do this with a flat list, in some way or another. Reality and our concept of it is very deeply nested, but since we only handle a bunch of abstractions at the same time, that's fine.
With folders, you have something that is explorable. You can still search, but if you don't have folders to begin with, you can only search -- and anything you don't think of searching for is either lost forever, or can be seen only as part of a huuuuuge list.
IMHO it's regression alright, no two ways about it.
I see only a few arguments in this text:
- the author does not think nested hierarchies are difficult. If he added "for nerds", I would agree with him.
- the author equates having limited nesting with the 'data silos' situation on iOS and (from what I read in reviews), in slightly lesser sense on Mac OS X Mountain Lion.
- claiming that the mouse is hard to use because it provides "indirect manipulation". That may seem so, but the human brain is exceptionally good at transferring motor skills between modalities. For example, anybody who can write can write with his feet, nose, car, or whatever, and the handwriting will (except for the quality of fine motor skills) be recognizable as yours (http://www.ebaumsworld.com/jokes/read/211551/)
- equating having limited nesting with vendor lock-in. Proprietary file formats are fine for doing that. I do not see why you would need to do anything more.