Folders Slashes and Collons

This Mac kids and all with a video on what I like to call folders, slashes, and colons.

So first of all, let me explain what it's about. On the file system on the Mac, or any Unix file system for that matter, it works out to be that a slash is the tree; it's the root of the tree. Then a folder comes off of that, so you'd represent it by slash folder. A folder can come off of that folder, so it's slash folder slash folder, etc.

So slashes are a magic character in the file system that represents a new level, basically. How can file and folder names have slash in them? They can't. It doesn't make any sense because if you add a file called slash, you put it in slash, you CD to slash, then you type RM slash, and that would delete slash, not the file.

Then why can we create a folder or a file on the Mac called slash? I have this folder called slash on my desktop. I used Finder to name it slash, save it, slash, a slash. This is obviously not... it can't have slashes in it.

Today, why does it let me put slashes in its name? Well, I figured out how it lets you do that. If you go into Terminal, you know whenever you drag a folder in, it gives you the name of the folder. It says slash user slash desktop slash a colon a colon a. Because any folder file name can, of course, have a cool indent, but if I try to name this colon, it doesn't let me name it colon.

So obviously, Apple thinks, um, the colons are less important than slashes because if I make a folder on my desktop through Terminal called folder colon folder, it'll appear as folder slash folder. So they've replaced... they make... whenever you create a folder or file with a slash in its name, you're actually creating a folder file with a colon in its name.

And since you can't use colons in names in Finder anymore because they just look like slashes, what are you gonna do, Apple? Apple took out the character that you wouldn't, that you shouldn't be able to put in folder names and replaced the character that you, well, should be able to put with it.

So it's totally absurd, in my opinion, but it also makes total sense. These folders are not what they're named, and once you're typing paths to guess where a file or folder is, you don't want to think it has flashes in its name.

So I thought it was important for me to make this video just to show you guys what it is that factor really does to allow you to create slashes in a folder name. Because Apple totally, um, confused me, and someone asked me what happens if I create a folder in my slash called slash, and I type RM.

That's sharp slash, um, and the fact is that that would delete your hard drive. So if I do, doesn't create folders with slashes in their name. The reason they probably did that is so you can put dates in your violet, and they didn't find the colons were as important.

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