Re: Proprietary Software term

[Wols Lists]

On 18/08/18 21:18, David Kastrup wrote:
>> "Undocumented proprietary format" doesn't express the intent which
>> > "lock-in" does. As David pointed out, patents can be used to protect
>> > a proprietary format, only I don't think that, for example, the exFAT
>> > filesystem is, in his words, a "strange case".

> A filesystem is not a file format.

What's the difference? As soon as you take the Unix "everything is a
file" approach, your filesystem IS a file format. I run VirtualBox - all
my filesystems really are files. Etc etc. Once you start digging, it's
all a distinction without a difference ...

(take a look at file containers, like zip, vorbis (or is it ogg), mp3
and mp4, etc. What IS the difference between a file and a filesystem?)

Cheers,
Wol