Re: Duplicate identifiers in a single namespace

On 10/5/2024 9:37 PM, Jasen Betts wrote:

Is this supported in an API?  Or, does an application wanting to interact
with "The Desktop" have to effectively implement the union internally?
>

However, MS's implementation exposes every object in the union
without a way of (easily) identifying which is which.  E.g., how
do YOU know that the PROPERTIES windows I displayed haven't been
reversed?

>
Microsoft making an ambiguous user inteface is neither surprising nor
interesting to me.

>
*My* concern is to whether this would ever have value:
       "And, what *value* to supporting this capability?"

 I'm not convinced that it even exists,  desktop icons have coordinates
and a keyboard navigation order, I'm not a aware of any way to reference
by "name".

I have a clock gadget colocated with the icon for a PDF.
It could just as easily be a folder icon, etc. -- MS seems
to like to slip things *under* my "gadgets".
What is the (x,y) name of each?

Two icons at the top have the same writing under them, but that
writing is not their name, it's only a partial representation.
their actual names on the desktop are their screen co-ordinates.

>
To the piece of *code*, that is the case.  But, to the human user,
the coordinates are insignificant.  I could swap those two icons
(indeed, a bug in Windows causes desktop contents to magically
reshuffle) while you are distracted and you would have no way of
identifying which is the one you "wanted" -- without consulting
meta information.
>
Similar ambiguity exists in the Start Menu.

 Suppose that in your class there are two people called "Mohammad Wong".
what are you going to do?

Isn't that the question I originally asked:
"How does (e.g., Windows) tolerate/differentiate between
multiple *identical* identifiers in a given namespace/context?"
I can suggest several different ways that a multiplicity of "objects"
having identical identifiers could be disambiguated.  But, is there
**value** in supporting multiple distinct objects having identical
identifiers in a single namespace?  Is there ever a case where the
hassle of disambiguating is outweighed by some perceived added value?

 Are we even still talking about name
spaces?