*** proposal.old	Thu Jun 23 08:40:13 2005
--- proposal	Thu Jun 23 14:24:04 2005
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*** 32,37 ****
--- 32,39 ----
  		Most users can't see hidden files under DOS or Windows
  		anyway; they have to get special tools to change them,
  		tools that are the equivalent of fsdb.
+ 	   This was incorrect even in 1996, so the decision not to
+ 	   productize "hidden"/"nohidden" was based on incorrect facts.
  
  	This situation has significantly changed eight years later.
  	- It is trivial today (a switch accessible in Windows' Explorer
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*** 62,67 ****
--- 64,108 ----
  	the current behaviour if the "nohidden" mount option is explicitly
  	used.
  
+ 	Reasoning
+ 	=========
+ 
+ 	Other alternatives such as having PCFS rename files with the
+ 	"hidden" PCFS attribute set to the UNIX-style ".hiddenfile"
+ 	(i.e prepend a filename with '.' to make it invisible in a
+ 	'ls' without '-l' option) were discussed but this causes
+ 	ambiguities as well as failure of existing applications that
+ 	expect to see files with a given name, a "hidden" attribute
+ 	notwithstanding. A real-world example application that
+ 	behaves like this is the UNIX program "gtkpod" that allows
+ 	access to Apple iPod music players.
+ 
+ 	Likewise, just documenting the existance of "hidden"/"nohidden"
+ 	mount options but not changing the default behaviour causes
+ 	bad user experience, because access to such files will need
+ 	explicit operator intervention, which again makes existing
+ 	applications fail which just expect to see such files.
+ 	The example for this is again "gtkpod".
+ 
+ 	Retaining and documenting the current "hidden"/"nohidden"
+ 	mount options but making "hidden" (show hidden files)
+ 	the default behaviour has the advantages:
+ 	1. No surprise to users/admins who found out about the
+ 	   undocumented options via Usenet, Solaris headers or
+ 	   www.opensolaris.org sourcecode.
+ 	2. No surprise to applications written for Linux, *BSD
+ 	   or MacOSX, which do not perform any "name translation"
+ 	   for hidden files. Such applications just work.
+ 	3. By far the best cost/benefit ratio of all options.
+ 
+ 	Note on "system" files
+ 	======================
+ 	The (also non-POSIX) "system" PCFS file attribute has no
+ 	bearing in this case - "system" does not imply "hidden".
+ 	This case does not attempt to define/modify PCFS's
+ 	behaviour wrt. to files having the "system" attribute
+ 	being set/unset.
+ 
  MAN PAGE CHANGES
  
  	The man page for mount_pcfs(1M) will be changed to include