trash specification: Why do we keep around .desktop files for metadata?

[Michael Richardson]

Christian Neumair wrote:
> Dear xdg list,
>
> Note that FAT32 (popular USB  stick / removable storage format) does not
> offer extended attributes, but it has other backdraws anyway, and taken
> its use-case we could just restore to the volume toplevel directory for
> removable volumes and not save the deletion date at all. As USB stick
> storage grows, people are more likely to use more advanced file systems
> like NTFS and ext*, which support extended attributes.
>   
I disagree with both points.
First, don't restore to the top-level directory, because FAT file 
systems have a limited (about 504) number of top-level directory 
entries. (Goes back to CP/M-80 days!!!), and people get caught by this 
more and more. If you organize your stuff by directories, then you have 
no limits.

Second, people don't use NTFS or ext* on removeable storage unless they 
are very knowledgeable, because those file systems are not very 
portable. (NTFS doesn't always work on Linux or Mac, and sometimes 
doesn't work between versions of windows either), while ext* is 
Linux-only.  People expect their USB sticks to just work, and so they 
have to stick to FAT32.


> Using FAT32 for permanent storage is not recommended, and it's not used
> on a daily basis anymore, so we shouldn't consider that an argument
> against extended attributes.
>   

alas, using usb sticks for permanent storage, and to get files between 
Linux and windows boots of the same computer is more and more common.
(No, I don't do it)