Re: Out of Control Aliases?
Re: Out of Control Aliases?
- Subject: Re: Out of Control Aliases?
- From: Ron Hunsinger <email@hidden>
- Date: Mon, 12 Nov 2012 13:29:44 -0800
On Nov 12, 2012, at 12:50 PM, Alex Zavatone <email@hidden> wrote:
> IIRC, part of the aliases are the images of the icons of the original file and as OS X has matured, much larger icon graphics (and many more sizes) have been added to just about every application. This produces copious bloat in each alias and it is not required.
It's only not required if it is acceptable that alias files have crappy (or generic) icons. If you don't want a discordance between the visual appearance of alias files and the visual appearance of all other files, the alias file does require a high-res icon.
> I long for the old days of the desktop db files where this information could be stored so that EVERY alias would not feel the need to carry a duplicate of the original item's icon graphics.
You're longing for days that never were. Alias files have ALWAYS contained a custom icon. The desktop db files NEVER could supply the missing icon reliably, because the desktop files were per-volume, and an alias could target files on another volume. If that volume was not mounted, its desktop was not accessible, and the only way for the alias file to sport a non-generic icon was to have its own custom icon.
In particular, an alias file can target a file on a network volume. Would you really want Finder to be mounting network volumes just because you opened a folder that contained an alias file? Just so Finder could display an icon? What if the folder contained a few hundred alias files? Would you really want Finder going across the network hundreds of times just to show the window? Networks were a lot slower then, but even at today's network speeds, disk is cheaper than time, and having network volumes mount gratuitously would be an enormous nuisance.
And no, I do not long for the "good old days" of the Desktop database. I seem to recall that we cursed at it long and loudly at the time.
-Ron Hunsinger
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