I think the case of hidden dot files is a good example of 'convention over configuration'[1].
Point is accepted, that it came into being due to a lazy programmer. But surely early people might have just liked the unintended consequence of some files (dot files) being hidden. Just like most of us, whenever we learnt unix thought that it is by design.
If early users, had found the consequence a handicap, it would have been fixed long back.
Its similar to the use of hash-tags on twitter or the @for addressing which got adopted by users first and so became features (although the paths to them being considered features are different).
Point is accepted, that it came into being due to a lazy programmer. But surely early people might have just liked the unintended consequence of some files (dot files) being hidden. Just like most of us, whenever we learnt unix thought that it is by design.
If early users, had found the consequence a handicap, it would have been fixed long back.
Its similar to the use of hash-tags on twitter or the @for addressing which got adopted by users first and so became features (although the paths to them being considered features are different).
[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Convention_over_configuration
Edit: Grammar