Thank Classilla dev for the Composer view that makes replying to everything so much easier
because in OS9, there is a desktop folder in every mounted volume, and their content simply gets combined depending on what volumes are mounted.
only the background image and the icon order might shapeshift.
Hmm that's interesting... I wonder if that's got something to do with an oddity I came across the other day: I bring downloads to the iBook with the USB stick because browsing through pages and pages of content is franky much easier on a big screen and a scroll wheel. I put the USB drive in, and moved some .sit file to the desktop. I unpacked it and installed the software. I can't remember what exactly happened, but since then, I had that .sit file disappear from the desktop whenever I unmounted USB drive, and reapper whenever I plugged it again! I thought it was really strange because I'm so used to thinking that a USB drive contains everything inside of it like a folder, never outside. Anyway, I deleted that ghost when the USB stick was plugged in so it's gone now. The only somewhat similar thing I've seen in OSX is that if you delete files from a USB stick and unmount it, then empty the trash, that'll only delete the trash that came from the computer's internal hard drive, but the trash from the USB drive will still be in the trash the next time you plug it in. Must be related to stuff that's normally hidden from the user's view.
the main reason why people didnt know that and didnt made use of it 25 years ago was that on a mac you normally did not create moe than one partition. the saying was "we dont need that like they do it on windows", but of course it is possible and it can have benefits.
I actually didn't see the obvious reason for it until SSDs: You wanted your OS onto the SSD, but couldn't afford it for storage. And well, the necessity of partitions are obvious if you need to install multiple systems onto the same machine, or you need to keep stuff apart for security reasons. But it strikes me as quite modern: Hard disk space was very expensive for quite a long time! I know a person who boasts about the time when he bought an iPod to use as an external hard drive because it was cheaper than buying an external hard drive that's actually sold as such!
in fact it is super easy to handle OS9 systems, because "the system" actually only consists of the content of this one folder and the PRAM settings, which are an insignificant trifle.
Where are the PRAM settings physically stored, actually? I have all that stuff ahead of my at some point because this iBook is having a clock issue, and it's a bit tedious to sync manually every time I boot up. It's the kind of tedious thing that you might typically automate with Applescript, but I'm yet to look into the Applescript of the OS9 era. I learned Applescript on an Intel machine, I have translated some bits for a PPC OSX (translated, because it's not all identical), so I expect OS9 to also have its slightly different terminology.
A bit of both actually, with the addition of ‘there’s not a lot of maneuvering room’. Given the snug innards of a laptop I remember it was a bit of a challenge to get things settled in just right so it all fit properly.
Ow. Well I hope it's the kind of stuff that doesn't risk causing weak points (cracks) to the main body. I'll definitely look up a lot of step by step articles with images before I even start. Macrumors forums has some experts who've done this a lot. Who's made a nice article with images is another thing.
For the records, Mac OS 9 got a "Multiuser Environment"! Personally I never used it, and I do not know anybody who does. But it is as simple usable as everything else of Mac OS 9 if you really would like to give it a try.
I think I saw it in extensions when disabling everything that didn't sound relevant...
About the desktop … Imagine, for complicated projects, you have other mass storage, mount them at a later point and by mounting the media, several folders (from anywher eint he folder hirachy) with the explicit position pop up and you can work in a defined "environment". And that independently from the OS and machine your are on, just stored at the media themselves! A working philosophy that no other OS offers!
Oh wow. I think I saw that in action somehow (see the beginning of my comment), and also, I couldn't help but notice that if I restart the computer after installing something, it unexpectedly opens all the Finder windows back. But I'd love to see a practical application of using this feature to work on complicated projects.
BTW, to all, do not forget to rebuild the desktop database on a regular basis, means once a month or similar!
What's that? Or alternatively: Are there any handy articles on starting out with OS9 that contain the *bare necessities* of what everyone should know when starting so they don't mess things up? An article that includes this concept. Whenever you're new to something, massive volumes of information are hard to approach because you don't know what of it is absolutely essential to know, and when.
