The Technology Vent and Rant Thread

[ownedbycats]

Is probably a bit unreasonable, but I've come to despise the word "app" when it is used in place of "program." (Though it's fine if specifically referring to an application run on a smartphone.)

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by ownedbycats

Is probably a bit unreasonable, but I've come to despise the word "app" when it is used in place of "program." (Though it's fine if specifically referring to an application run on a smartphone.)

Why can't it be a program on a smartphone? Why does it have to be an app?

[JSWolf]

It's not a folder. It's a DIRECTORY!

[Hitch]

Originally Posted by ownedbycats

Is probably a bit unreasonable, but I've come to despise the word "app" when it is used in place of "program." (Though it's fine if specifically referring to an application run on a smartphone.)

Amen to that. It's...irritating but there are other things that are far worse, really.

Hitch

[j.p.s]

Originally Posted by ownedbycats

Is probably a bit unreasonable, but I've come to despise the word "app" when it is used in place of "program." (Though it's fine if specifically referring to an application run on a smartphone.)

I think the use of "app" as short for "application" predates "smart" phones by decades.

What is truly despicable is "tech" to mean something narrow and specific compared to all of technology.

[BetterRed]

Originally Posted by j.p.s

I think the use of "app" as short for "application" predates "smart" phones by decades.

But its usage took off with the advent of the iPhone in 2007.

https://books.google.com/ngrams/grap...19&smoothing=3

I dislike the exclamatory manner in which the wordlet is pronounced by many Australian and British radio and television presenters - in particular those who work for the respective public broadcasters.

BR

[John F]

Originally Posted by j.p.s

I think the use of "app" as short for "application" predates "smart" phones by decades.

...

I don't think so, or at least in a very limited or different way. From my recollection, it was "program" or "software" or "utility".

[j.p.s]

Originally Posted by j.p.s

I think the use of "app" as short for "application" predates "smart" phones by decades.

Originally Posted by John F

I don't think so, or at least in a very limited or different way. From my recollection, it was "program" or "software" or "utility".

Software has been split between system programs and application programs since the advent of operating systems.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Application_program

I have read, heard, and said aplication(s) and app(s) for many years. Everyone's experience is different.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by Hitch

Amen to that. It's...irritating but there are other things that are far worse, really.

Hitch

And one of them is calling a directory a folder. That's wrong and always will be.

[Renate]

I prefer "directory" to "folder" too, but "directory" is something that points you where.
Yeah, that's the underlying thing of what we're talking about, but "set" (not the verb) or "container" or "folder" is more logically correct.

[Hitch]

Originally Posted by Renate

I prefer "directory" to "folder" too, but "directory" is something that points you where.
Yeah, that's the underlying thing of what we're talking about, but "set" (not the verb) or "container" or "folder" is more logically correct.

OH-EM-Gee, me too. FOLDER drives me nuts. And "directory" is just not used, anywhere, by anybody in GenPop. :-)

Hitch

[Thasaidon]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

And one of them is calling a directory a folder. That's wrong and always will be.

Technically you are right but for years during the reign of DOS folders were commonly and usually called directories and I still prefer "DIRECTORY"

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by Thasaidon

Technically you are right but for years during the reign of DOS folders were commonly and usually called directories and I still prefer "DIRECTORY"

DOS doesn't have folder. It has DIRECTORIES! Folders is just the wrong name for directories.

[DNSB]

For what it is worth, directories as a name for a computer file structure containing references to files and other directories including subdirectories predates the use of folders or drawers as a name by several years. The Xerox Star used a file folder icon to represent directories and it seems that almost every GUI OS since then has used a file folder icon.

I've given up on the argument much as I've given up on arguing that a PC is not necessarily using Windows as the operating system.

[pdurrant]

The original Mac Filing System didn't have directories, but did have folders. Really. All files were stored flat on disc, but metadata allowed them to be displayed in the Finder in Folders.

So IMO you should use folders if talking about a GUI, and directories if use a CLI.