Plain-text files are at risk
Plain-text files are at risk
纯文本文件正面临风险
For better or worse, plain-text files, with their many encodings and layered formats, are the only real universal data interface we have had so far. By plain-text files, I mean notes.txt/md/ini/json/etc. The files are actual files stored on a filesystem. The user can use them in any application which generally deals with files, such as attaching them to emails, sharing/accessing them via general HTTP/NAS servers etc. The content is only plain-text. It can be read/edited/saved using even the most basic general-purpose text editor like nano. Different text editors can work interoperably on such files without conflicting with each other. Rich-text editors can open these files but often can’t edit/save them while preserving their plain-text nature or make it hard to do so. You do not need any cloud connection to read these files. They are simply stored on (and sometimes synced from) your local storage device.
无论好坏，纯文本文件凭借其多样的编码和分层格式，是我们迄今为止拥有的唯一真正通用的数据接口。我所说的纯文本文件，是指 .txt、.md、.ini、.json 等格式的文件。这些文件是存储在文件系统中的实体文件。用户可以在任何处理文件的应用程序中使用它们，例如将其作为附件发送邮件，或通过通用的 HTTP/NAS 服务器进行共享和访问。其内容仅为纯文本，即使使用像 nano 这样最基础的通用文本编辑器也能进行读取、编辑和保存。不同的文本编辑器可以互操作地处理这些文件，而不会产生冲突。富文本编辑器虽然能打开这些文件，但往往无法在保持其纯文本特性的前提下进行编辑或保存，或者操作起来非常困难。你不需要任何云连接来读取这些文件，它们只是存储在（有时会从）你的本地存储设备上。
Nearly every OS ships a plain-text editor by default. Not just Linux/BSDs, but Microsoft (Notepad) and macOS (TextEdit). But interest in plain-text editing has been fading for a while now. Just 20 years ago, it was normal to use such editors regularly, even if you were a layperson. Rich-text editors were likely used more overall or for “real work”. But use of plain-text editors was completely normal for note taking, quick scribbling etc. Plain text files were used as a versatile data format. “Notes” could be anything like contact numbers, dates, shopping lists, etc.
几乎每个操作系统都默认内置了纯文本编辑器。不仅是 Linux/BSD，微软（记事本）和 macOS（文本编辑）也不例外。但人们对纯文本编辑的兴趣已经消退了一段时间。就在 20 年前，即使是普通用户，经常使用这类编辑器也是常态。虽然富文本编辑器在整体上或处理“正式工作”时使用得更多，但使用纯文本编辑器进行笔记记录、快速涂鸦等是非常普遍的。纯文本文件曾被用作一种多功能的数据格式，“笔记”可以是联系电话、日期、购物清单等任何内容。
Smartphones replacing desktops for the masses probably dealt the biggest blow to plain-text files. The smartphone duopoly did not ship with plain-text editors. No real third-party ecosystem for plain-text editing emerged either. Nearly all text input on smartphones is done on complex/proprietary formats via highly specialized “apps”. The average computer user has essentially forgotten about plain-text files by now. Even the idea of just “files” is eroding.
智能手机取代桌面电脑成为大众主流，这可能对纯文本文件造成了最大的打击。智能手机的双寡头垄断并没有预装纯文本编辑器，也没有出现真正的第三方纯文本编辑生态系统。智能手机上几乎所有的文本输入都是通过高度专业化的“应用程序”，以复杂或专有的格式完成的。如今，普通电脑用户基本上已经遗忘了纯文本文件，甚至连“文件”这一概念本身也在逐渐淡化。
The last group keeping plain-text files alive is software engineers. Code is plain-text and developing any software essentially forces you to deal with plain-text files and the filesystem. Even if you are just a systems administrator, you likely still need to interact with plain-text configuration and log files often enough. This has led to significant innovation in plain-text editing. See the very large ecosystem of code editors and the plugins surrounding them. This is not limited to just free software. Some engineers pay a non-trivial amount of money for proprietary editors.
目前维持纯文本文件生存的最后群体是软件工程师。代码本身就是纯文本，开发任何软件本质上都迫使你与纯文本文件和文件系统打交道。即使你只是一个系统管理员，也经常需要与纯文本配置文件和日志文件交互。这推动了纯文本编辑领域的重大创新，看看围绕代码编辑器及其插件所形成的庞大生态系统就知道了。这不仅限于自由软件，一些工程师甚至愿意支付不菲的费用购买专有编辑器。
Except now, software developers are doing their text input in LLM repls. Even writing documentation is being outsourced to the LLM repls. The death of manual editing of code/docs is regularly being predicted on tech forums. The produced code/docs are often only reviewed as a diff in a web interface, if that, so opening the editor can be skipped altogether. So what happens if this final audience for plain-text files abandons ship as well?
然而现在，软件开发者们开始在 LLM REPL（大语言模型交互环境）中进行文本输入。甚至连编写文档的工作也被外包给了 LLM REPL。技术论坛上经常有人预言手动编写代码或文档的时代即将终结。生成的代码或文档通常只在网页界面的差异对比（diff）中查看，甚至连看都不看，因此完全可以跳过打开编辑器这一步。那么，如果纯文本文件的最后这批用户也弃之而去，会发生什么呢？
It’s not far-fetched to assume that maintenance of plain-text editors and the ecosystem surrounding them will stop. Since the operating systems, libraries etc. that support these editors will continue to change, existing editors might simply stop working on updated software stacks. With multimedia and document files already being accessed mostly by specialized apps labelled “gallery” etc., it’s possible that we will also stop using file managers altogether, and they will suffer the same fate as plain-text editors.
可以预见，纯文本编辑器及其周边生态系统的维护工作可能会停止。由于支持这些编辑器的操作系统、库等会不断更新，现有的编辑器很可能在更新后的软件栈上无法运行。随着多媒体和文档文件大多已被标记为“相册”等专业应用程序所接管，我们甚至可能彻底停止使用文件管理器，它们最终会遭遇与纯文本编辑器相同的命运。
The war on general computing will likely continue as well, making it difficult for an individual to build/deploy a seemingly simple piece of software to read/edit text files without the blessing of a corporation and/or state. Even if you know that LLM repls can’t replace all the tools they promise to replace, the majority of people are adopting them today as if they can. Society can remain irrational longer than you can remain a relevant nonconformist. The most versatile, universal data interface we’ve ever had might no longer be accessible.
针对通用计算的“战争”很可能会持续下去，使得个人在没有企业或政府许可的情况下，难以构建或部署一个看似简单的软件来读取或编辑文本文件。即使你知道 LLM REPL 无法取代它们所承诺取代的所有工具，但大多数人今天都在盲目地采用它们。社会保持非理性的时间，可能比你保持相关性（作为异见者）的时间还要长。我们曾经拥有过的最通用、最灵活的数据接口，或许终将不再触手可及。