Exploring our file systems

Prototyping class (27 January 2026) in the context of SI29 and the collective exploration of file sharing

our file systems

understanding our file system

From l-o-c-a-l-h-o-s-t.com, a long term project initiated by Dave Young in 2016, https://web.archive.org/web/20200813111950/https://dvyng.com/log/localhost-RWX/localhost-RWX.html:

As we increasingly outsource our data storage to "the cloud" and manage it with the multitude of apps on our smart devices, the traditional experience of the filesystem - with its associated workplace metaphors of files and folders - is being outmoded. At RWX, we will speculate on how this evolving experience of the filesystem mediates the existing frameworks and aesthetics of digital tool use, and collaboratively develop a series of responses that imagine how it could influence artistic production in the future.

touring around

home:

$ cd ~

root:

$ cd /

admin stuff:

$ cd /etc/ (in linux)

logs:

$ cd /var/log/
$ journalctl

Reference: Melanie Hoff, Peer-to-Peer Folder Poetry, workshop at Radical Networks (2019) https://www.radicalnetworks.org/archives/2019/participants/melanie-hoff/

What if we could transform our online networks from something we passively receive to something we actively create? Folder Poetry is the practice of using the structure of computer folder organization as a new kind of poetic form like the haiku or iambic pentameter. By naming and nesting folders and files, we can create unfolding narratives, rhythmic prose, and choose-your-own-adventure poetry.

https://www.are.na/digital-love-languages/folder-poetry-fm8h1k8vsfk

limits

What are limits of our filesystem?

$ df -h

and to see what type of filesystem you are using:

$ df -Th

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_file_systems#Limits

See the size of a specific folder:

$ du -d 1 -h

exercises: navigating our file systems

$ man find

count how many PDFs you have in the home folder on your computer

$ find ~ | grep .pdf > pdfs.txt
$ cat pdfs.txt | wc -l 

same for jpgs!

as above, but with .jpg

count how many folders you have on your computer

$ sudo su
$ cd /
$ find -type d > /home/mb/folders.txt
$ cat /home/mb/folders.txt | wc -l

same for files!

-type f

shared file systems

pubnix servers

• https://tilde.town
• https://tilde.club
• (many more!)

Atelierhouse Next Cloud

https://core.servus.at/de/node/4689

splinter

infrastructure research and project at Constant

https://circulations.constantvzw.org/ (since 2023)

in continuation of etherbox: https://networksofonesown.constantvzw.org/etherbox/manual.html (since ±2013?)

and as part of it, the etherdump tool: https://etherdump.constantvzw.org/

collective self-hosting initiatives

such as the collective server of Varia

which triggered the making/using of distribusi: https://git.vvvvvvaria.org/varia/distribusi

• https://archive.simonbrowne.page/
• https://ururu.cloud/ (initiative by https://dianaband.in/ )
• https://vvvvvvaria.org/archive/
• https://networksofonesown.vvvvvvaria.org/

our sandboxes

:)

exercise ./myfolder/

personal folder story telling exercise

• choose one folder on your own computer
• run tree with HTML export turned on:

$ tree . -H > mytree.html

• annotate this HTML file with short personal memories/anecdotes/stories
• upload your HTML file to /var/www/html/SI29/file-sharing/file-systems/

notes

bash on Windows

For this class we will use some terminal tools that i would not know how to use on Windows. After thinking about what to do, it feels like using WSL (the windows subsystem for linux) would make a lot of sense. It is basically running Linux on top of Windows.

Are you using WSL already?
Would you mind installing it?

I found these two guided with installation instructions:

• for windows 10: https://www.geeksforgeeks.org/techtips/use-bash-shell-natively-windows-10/ (this seems to be a way to not install WSL as a whole, but just run bash from the Windows terminal.... (!))
• for windows 11: https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/wsl/install

With the windows 10 tutorial it was possible to make bash work within my windows file system! Maybe try if it works that way for 11 too.

tree on Windows

Luca: ok, managed to get tree to work in the git bash by making an alias with the tree command existent in Windows, for posterity:

1. find the .bashrc file in the root directory and open it in text editor
2. add alias tree='cmd //c tree.com //a' and save
3. Open git bash again, should be working now