[Discuss] File Systems vs.Databases Was: Re: SSH options (was Future of X11 (was Trying to connect to internet in Debian))

[slitt at troubleshooters.com (Steve Litt)]

Kent Borg said on Fri, 23 Jan 2026 06:23:32 -0800


>Don't underestimate how hard a file system is to make. My wife's work 
>uses Google web apps but they might switch to MS's competing products 
>(horrors). One of the complaints is Google can't reliably store
>"files", they move around and get lost. Maybe Google stores the files
>themselves as blobs out in a file system, but all the metadata about
>the file, including the simulated "location" that is presented to the
>user, is being stored in a database. And it is hard to get that right. 
>(Particularly in this world of continuous integration/continuous 
>deployment, that worships feature velocity, is not designed before it
>is built, and fired the QA department.)

If by "web apps" you mean wordprocessor, spreadsheet, presentation,
drawing, etc, if you do that with software on the web, you're asking
for data loss. And it's no surprise that all these web apps make it
difficult to make a local backup: They want to be able to hold your
data hostage. There are plenty of Free Software programs that run
locally on Linux, Windows or Mac, that allow you to own your own data.

SteveT

Steve Litt 

http://444domains.com