ABOUT THIS DIRECTORY

This directory contains material which did not fit cleanly
somewhere else.

Potential contents include:

  > RANDOM NOTES
  > STRAY FILES
  > UNCLASSIFIED ARTIFACTS
  > ONE-OFF EXPERIMENTS
  > WEIRD MEDIA
  > PARTIAL RECOVERIES
  > FILES WITH NO CONTEXT
  > THINGS FOUND WHILE LOOKING FOR SOMETHING ELSE

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MISC INDEX

No public entries currently indexed.

This is almost certainly temporary.

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root@snakepit:~/archive# cat misc/CLASSIFICATION.txt

CLASSIFICATION PROCEDURE

Does the file obviously belong somewhere else?

  YES -> PUT IT THERE.

  NO  -> CONTINUE.

Do we know what it is?

  YES -> DOCUMENT IT.

  NO  -> CONTINUE.

Does it seem interesting?

  YES -> KEEP IT.

  NO  -> PROBABLY KEEP IT ANYWAY.

RESULT:

MISC.

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KNOWN FAILURE MODES

  [01] FILE HAS NO EXTENSION.

  [02] FILE HAS WRONG EXTENSION.

  [03] FILE IS CALLED "NEW.TXT."

  [04] FILE IS CALLED "OLD.TXT."

  [05] FILE IS CALLED "STUFF."

  [06] FILE CONTAINS SOMETHING IMPORTANT.

  [07] NOBODY REMEMBERS WHY.

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root@snakepit:~/archive# file misc/unknown.dat

misc/unknown.dat: data

root@snakepit:~/archive# strings misc/unknown.dat | head

hello
test
serial
password
DO_NOT_DELETE
banana

root@snakepit:~/archive# echo $VERDICT

ABSOLUTELY NO IDEA.

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RECOVERY NOTES

Files recovered from old media may initially land here when:

  > ORIGINAL PURPOSE IS UNKNOWN
  > TIMESTAMPS ARE UNRELIABLE
  > FORMAT IS UNCLEAR
  > DIRECTORY STRUCTURE IS LOST
  > CONTEXT IS MISSING
  > WE GOT DISTRACTED

Items may later be moved into a more specific archive.

Or not.

Entropy also gets a vote.

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root@snakepit:~/archive# ./cleanup misc/

SCANNING...

duplicate_file.txt ........ POSSIBLE DUPLICATE
old_config.bak ............ PROBABLY IMPORTANT
untitled.bin .............. UNKNOWN
notes2.txt ................. VAGUE
junk/ ...................... SUSPICIOUSLY LARGE

DELETE UNNECESSARY FILES? [y/N] n

WISE.

WE HAVE BEEN HURT BEFORE.

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MISC PHILOSOPHY

Not everything needs a category immediately.

Classification can happen later.

Deletion cannot always be undone.

Storage is cheap.

Regret is expensive.

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root@snakepit:~/archive# find ./misc -type f | wc -l

0

root@snakepit:~/archive# sleep 30

root@snakepit:~/archive# find ./misc -type f | wc -l

417

root@snakepit:~/archive# echo $WHAT_HAPPENED

NORMAL OPERATIONS.

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[ RETURN TO ARCHIVE ]
[ RETURN TO ROOT ]

root@snakepit:~/archive#