Intent to Prototype: FileSystemObserver
Austin Sullivan
Contact emails
Explainer
https://github.com/whatwg/fs/blob/main/proposals/FileSystemObserver.md
Summary
The FileSystemObserver interface for the File System specification will much more easily allow a website to be notified of changes to the file system.
The file system is a shared resource that can be modified from several contexts. A Bucket File System (a.k.a. an Origin Private File System, or OPFS) spans numerous agents - tabs, workers, etc - within the same storage key. The local file system also spans across origins and other applications on the host operating system.
Currently, for a given agent to know about modifications to the file system - made either by itself or from some external context - it must poll the file system to detect changes. This is inefficient and does not scale well.
The proposed interface can be used to observe both files on the user's local device (as specified in WICG/file-system-access) and files in the Bucket File System (as specified in whatwg/fs).
Blink component
TAG review
https://github.com/w3ctag/design-reviews/issues/868
TAG review status
Pending
Risks
Interoperability and Compatibility
Gecko: No signal
WebKit: No signal
Web developers: Strongly positive (WICG/file-system-access#72, whatwg/fs#123, w3c/IndexedDB#51)
Ergonomics
This will significantly improve the ergonomics of watching file paths, which currently requires polling the file system for changes. See example code in the Key Scenarios section of the explainer.
Security
This API does not expose any information to the web that isn’t already exposed, nor does it expand the permissions of a website as a result of a file system change. See the Permissions Considerations, Fingerprinting Risk, and Privacy Considerations sections of the explainer for more details.
Debuggability
N/A
Will this feature be supported on all six Blink platforms (Windows, Mac, Linux, Chrome OS, Android, and Android WebView)?
Yes
Is this feature fully tested by web-platform-tests?
Not yet
Flag name
FileSystemObserver
Requires code in //chrome?
False
Tracking bug
Link to entry on the Chrome Platform Status
https://chromestatus.com/feature/4622243656630272
This intent message was generated by Chrome Platform Status.