File Managers Virtually Don't Exist to Young People

Despite what some people will tell you, technology becoming easier to use is a good thing. For every grandma who uses Linux there are likely hundreds of thousands of elderly people who can hardly use Windows. There's nothing wrong with that, for most of their life using a computer wasn't required; in fact computers in their current form didn't exist for a good majority of their life. Devices that are designed to be simple, such as iPads, as well as accessibility features such as easy mode (or assistive access, or whatever its called on your device) allow these people to use technology in a simple, easy interface.

While these devices might be great for the elderly or people with disabilities, young people are also being forced to use these dumbed down devices. Instead of having a computer lab, most schools give the younger students an iPad, and upgrade them to a Chromebook after a certain grade. While these devices do the job, they aren't good at teaching students computer skills. In my opinion, the area where this is hurting young students the most is using a file manager.

iOS

The way files work on iOS devices is quite dumbed down. Most photos and videos are saved to the Photos app, where all traditional methods of file management are thrown out the window. There are no folders, all your media is one big life stream. The closest you can get to organization is albums, but those act more like tags than folders.

It wasn't until iOS 11 when iOS finally got a file explorer, and it was quite basic. At least you can finally save files other than images or video. But the problem is that most apps don't use the files app. For example, in an app like CapCut your projects aren't saved as files you can see, but as "projects" in the app. You can't move your projects to another storage device^[1], they're just apart of the app. If you delete the app, all your projects are also deleted. And apps that do use files have an incredibly simplified execution of it.

As an example, I'm going to use the GarageBand app. When the app is opened, this is what you see:

There are 3 paths that can be taken here:

• Create a new file
• Open a recent file
• Browse for a file

First, I want to talk about the recent files list. This isn't too bad, in fact most apps, even on desktop, have a recent files list. Being able to quickly jump back into what you were last doing is nice. My main issue is how this works combined with other features.

Let's say that you want to create a new file. When you hit create, it instantly makes a new file. Now, most desktop programs (at least on Windows) also function this way. The main difference is on Windows you will eventually need to save the file. This requires you selecting a location to save the file to, as well as giving the file a name. On iOS, the file is saved automatically to wherever you selected the root folder to be, which is most likely "iCloud Drive" by default. And you're never prompted to rename the file (at least in GarageBand), you have to manually do that. As a result, you end up with a stream of unlabeled, unorganized files (as you can see in my screenshot).

Finally, you can browse for a file. This works like opening a file on any other desktop device.

Here you can make folders and actually organize everything, as well as create new files wherever you want. I wonder how many people actually use this frequently, because I sure know I don't.

Because of all this, the only thing that the files app is really used for is managing downloads from the web browser. I'm willing to bet most people have only opened the files app if they absolutely had to.

Chrome OS

Chromebooks are one step forwards and two steps back. While they have a basic file manager, I find the ways they work, especially in schools, completely ruins the perception of how a file manager works.

The biggest thing is that at least school issued Chromebooks don't have apps. Everything happens in the cloud. Only a couple years ago did chromeOS gain the ability to edit .txt files. Instead, you're supposed to use products such as the Google Workspace suite of apps. You can use Google Drive to organize files within the Google Workspace, but I don't see most people do that. Instead, I see them go to the homepages for each product (Docs, Sheets, Slides, etc.) and look for the file there, which shows a recents view.

This problem is even worse if a school uses Google Classroom. Students no longer need to make a copy of a file, as the copy is already created for them. Additionally, the ability to make new files is built into Classroom, so everything is automatically organized in a way that never requires students to visit their Drive. Students just need to check the assignment page, and all files are right there.

Additionally, Workspace and Drive kill off some traditional aspects of file managers (which isn't a bad thing). For example, file extensions are basically irrelevant, and file names are just the document title. Version history is automatically kept in the document as well, you don't need to make a copy for each file revision.

The only thing that I feel the files app is ever used for on Chrome OS is downloading images. And as a result, I feel the concept of files becomes more abstract. I cannot tell you the amount of times I asked someone to send me an image for a school project, and instead of uploading the file to a folder and sending it, they pasted each image into its own separate document and shared the document with me. Did they know there's an upload button?

Everyone says that a command line interface would kill a zoomer or gen alpha, but being honest, I think right clicking a music file on Windows 10 would do the same thing (seriously, why is the context menu the height of my entire screen).