There is no way that Apple is going to add any sort of direct file access into iOS 6. This would completely undermine the work that they have done to get rid of the metaphor.
That said, there is certainly a problem with how files interact with iOS, mainly when it comes to email. Bridging the gap between the non-mobile file world and the pseudo-fileless iOS is going to be tricky.
It wouldn't be direct file access, but document access.
My vision for that is an API to expose documents in my app, and letting other apps open my editor in a fullscreen dialog, just like the email composer dialog.
The iOS today is very app-centric, and this would make it more document-centric.
Usually, if I want to share pictures or whatever, I am in the application that makes it easiest to navigate or search the content I want to send. Then I tap the share button. In fact I do a similar thing in Mac OSX. The iOS email client has only annoyed me a few times.
What they need is something like Intents on Android or maybe something like Services on Mac OS X.
It is too complicated and abstract for ordinary people to understand, and it is spiced with a sense of inherent danger since critical system files cannot be modified without doing significant damage to the system- system files that are right there along your ordinary user files which are impossible to find unless you can remember what you named it.
> It is too complicated and abstract for ordinary people to understand
Evidence?
> spiced with a sense of inherent danger since critical system files cannot be modified without doing significant damage to the system- system files that are right there along your ordinary user files
Not on any operating system released in nearly 10 years.
> impossible to find unless you can remember what you named it.
UX is a problem, but eliminating files just creates other, in my opinion much worse problems, namely that all "files" or "documents" are tied to one specific application.
The evidence for the file system problem can be found in pretty much any book about user interfaces, but I have already linked to one in the post you are replying to. But aside from any arbitrary book on the subject, the evidence is not hard to find. All you really have to do is watch a computer novice try to use a computer for any length of time.
I don't know what operating systems you are using, but My mac with the latest operating system still has a multiple "library" folders and a "system" folder. I presume windows 7 still has a windows folder, a program files folder, and documents and settings folders. Any unix type system has /usr /bin /var /etc . These things are so apparently ingrained it appears you are incapable of perceiving them.
as for your third point, this is what is called the fallacy of the false dichotomy or false dilemma. The solution for this is that there's more than just the 2 options you are imagining.
> I don't know what operating systems you are using, but My mac with the latest operating system still has a multiple "library" folders and a "system" folder. I presume windows 7 still has a windows folder, a program files folder, and documents and settings folders. Any unix type system has /usr /bin /var /etc . These things are so apparently ingrained it appears you are incapable of perceiving them.
Those operating systems do separate user and system files with different permissions. Some even default to putting user files on a separate partition.
> as for your third point, this is what is called the fallacy of the false dichotomy or false dilemma. The solution for this is that there's more than just the 2 options you are imagining.
That said, there is certainly a problem with how files interact with iOS, mainly when it comes to email. Bridging the gap between the non-mobile file world and the pseudo-fileless iOS is going to be tricky.