The Briefcase was a godsend back when removable storage was used to move files between computers and there was no other way to keep things synced. It's a shame they removed it.

You could always just build such a system yourself quite trivially by getting an FTP account, mounting it locally with curlftpfs, and then using SVN or CVS on the mounted filesystem.

;)

Certainly more reliable than dropbox

Back when? :) Putting things on a flash drive and plugging it elsewhere is still the best/easiest way to move files in many situations.

Think floppier...

Never used Briefcase. I just remember being confused by it as a kid. I did, however, use Iomega Zip Drives to move large (at the time) files.

The briefcase was for situations where you'd have local copies of many smaller files, and wanted to keep the files up-to-date between multiple computers. Back in '95 it wasn't uncommon for multiple employees, pupils or family members to share a small number of computers. Many homes had none. Working straight against the floppy was too slow, but syncing everything with the briefcase once you were done would speed up the workflow.

What could it do that onedrive cannot do?

Work offline. That's about it.

OneDrive can work offline if you set it to actually sync all of your files.

“offline” as in - on a computer that has no internet conmection whatsoever and syncing with floppy drives etc

Precisely. Also, no internal network. Employees shared data by passing floppies back and forth.

Briefcase also used shell extension madness, and allowed registration of merge handlers: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/win32/lwef/briefcas...

Never had a clue what that thing did.

As a kid, I used the briefcase as a normal folder (I think) just because the icon looked cooler.

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