Reimagining Desktop Operating System in the Era of Web 3.0

• “Bill Gates referred to the WinFS(Windows Future Storage) as his greatest disappointment with Microsoft.” ⤴️
• “How bytes are packed into a file is highly application-specific. And so, data sharing within a single file requires the applications to have a common parsing logic. This storage method can be inconvenient when we use thousands of applications developed by different vendors for different purposes.” ⤴️
• “In the case of using file manager applications like Windows Explorer, you can only find files by using metadata like file name, extension name, and file creation time. You can’t find files with just the file content.” ⤴️
• “When in a synchronization conflict, these services can only overwrite a whole file.” ⤴️
• “WinFS is also designed to be a decentralized store. Its data can be stored and synchronized anywhere. It can be set up locally, in the cloud, or on self-hosted servers.” ⤴️
• “Unlike decentralization in the blockchain, decentralization in the WinFS context is more similar to like the early Internet protocols (i.e. SMTP). The data are still stored in a centralized location, but you have the power to choose which one. Whether you store it in the cloud service or your local device doesn’t affect the functionality of WinFS. And, you can move the data to another location at any time.” ⤴️
• “steer desktop computing from being based on native applications and unstructured data to being based on compound documents and structured data.” ⤴️
• ““The idea of WinFS was ahead of its time, which will re-emerge.” By: Bill Gates” ⤴️
• “a compound document is a canvas that can contain any content. You can include not only rich text but also interactive widgets, forms, or any other types of documents.” ⤴️
• “the relationship between a compound document and a unified storage like WinFS is a bit like the relationship between the shell and the kernel of an operating system. The kernel provides the foundational capabilities to the platform, while the shell enables humans to interact with the kernel to use these capabilities.” ⤴️
• “a web page is actually a typical compound document” ⤴️
• “DesktopOS are being immensely impacted by browsers that even professional applications like Figma and VSCode are switching to being browser-based.” ⤴️
• “Process automation tools such as Zapier and Power Automate” ⤴️
• “are more like ferry boats traveling between data silos rather than a real and lasting bridge.” ⤴️
• “The popularity of serverless has also driven the developers to build a web application more like a compound document.” ⤴️
• “With the rise of web3, people expect the Web not only to be readable and writable but also to be owned. A web version of “WinFS” would help to achieve this goal. Sir. Tim Berners-Lee, the inventor of the Web, is working on a new project called Solid to accomplish this. IPLD(InterPlanetary Linked Data), a sub-project of IPFS, also plans to achieve the same goal by solving the shortcomings of IPFS in structured data.” ⤴️
• “Just as the user cannot use the operating system kernel without the shell, the compound document and web-based unified storage should be considered as a whole.” ⤴️
• “An operating system is system software that provides common capabilities for applications and ensures interoperability between different applications. For example, the operating system provides a clipboard and file system to enable applications to share data.” ⤴️
• “The block editor can be practically equated with the compound document editor.” ⤴️
• “Recent products like the Microsoft Loop, AnyType, Hash.ai, and MashCard are like the shell that wraps around the kernel of unified storage. They can store an unprecedented variety of data, such as structured database blocks, semi-structured rich text blocks, and unstructured attachment blocks.” ⤴️