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Seriously, I am way geeking out in this post. If it weren’t for the fact I wrote so much without realizing it, I would delete this post just as quick as all the others (this is post number 325, yet I only have 155 on my blog. Hmm…). Still, if things like file system jokes sound like your idea of a chuckle, then by all means read on.

I hear a lot of talk about how great Linux is, stable this, open-source that, blah blah blah, but it came through where both Windows (micro$uck, am i rite?!?!) and Mac OS (more like crap os!!1!1) failed horribly and repeatedly, specifically transferring files between the platforms. Let’s go to the chart.

Windows, home of NTFS and FAT32. I’m leaving FAT16 and FAT12 out of this since they are really quite old and no one likes them because they’re FAT. Also, there is no chart, that was just a segue. Sorry to disappoint you. NTFS support is a Windows exclusive, so that won’t work for cross-platform file transferification. FAT32 is more or less universally accessible, but has such exciting features as a 32 GB partition limit and 4 GB file limit. Of course, the FAT32 specifications actually allows for partitions up to 2 terabytes in size, but Windows XP is all like, “oh no you di’int” and gives you a logical drive error if you try to format over 32 gigs. It turns out that Mac OS has no trouble at all formatting FAT32 partitions larger than 32 GB, so put that in your pipe and smoke it, Microsoft. Still, the 4 GB file limit is real buzz kill. Let’s go crash Apple’s party.

On the think different side of things, Mac OS is just as bad. HFS+ is just like NTFS: only its native OS can read it. There is MacDrive, a program that allows Mac volumes to be read by Windows, but it’s not free and that simply isn’t acceptable. I fully expect every piece of software I use to be completely functioning and open source or creative commons or whatever it takes so that I can use it without paying anyone. That’s the right attitude about software, right? Am I laying it on too thick? HFS, the previous Mac file system, isn’t any more helpful than its beplussed successor, and just like FAT32 comes with the apparently very hip 4 GB file size limitation. Not so good for moving around large DV files or pirated movies. I mean no.

Then, like a Phoenix rising out of Arizona, the Linux file system appeared to me. Ext2 it was called, and free drivers existed so that it could be read on all platforms, with only a minimal amount of file system weirdness. It supported any size partition that I cared to throw at it, and there were no file size limitations as far as the eye could see. The G5 I’m using is a bit touchy, and sometimes decides that it’s not going to mount the drive all the way, but a swift kick to the case trip to the Disk Utility sorts that out right quick. Without actually using Linux I am benefiting from it. Some die-hards might say that it would simply be easier to use the Linux file system from within Linux, but I think I’ll just sit here and capture digital video while they’re busy compiling Firewire support into the colonel. Kernel. Whatever.

I think I will close with some facts that you can use if you want to impress people at parties. Did you know that NTFS has a theoretical limit of 16 exabytes? One exabyte, or EB, is equivalent to one billion gigabytes! If bytes were pennies and you had an exabyte worth of them, good lord man, that would be a lot of pennies! Also, I am the only person on the Internet to ever use the word beplussed.