Ask HN: Nobody versions their work files?
Just wondering what's your experience with people (colleagues or clients) sending you files at work; I've noticed no ones ever versions their files ever and keep the same filename over and over. For example for video task A they'll keep sending you A.mp4 forever, expecting you to never try to organize the files sent.
Versioning is a pretty simple organization rule though. Keep the same filename beginning, add some variations and end with vX. vX > xY means X was created after Y. It doesn't matter if X grows to 100, at least it'll only be increasing in time. Do not ever send a "vFINAL" it is NEVER final !
"A fixed mistake v5.mp4" is always going to be more recent than "A new blue background v2.mp4". I can tell you exactly "please fix that text at timecode 00:00:12:24 in A v9.mp4" and "I liked what you did in the previous version A v6.mp4 let's bring it back" instead of spending half an hour scrambling through old files and taking screenshots.
Those are pretty basic rules, which no ones follows, no ones knows about, even creative workers who deal with media file every day don't think about doing that. But I've seen this done in big teams of video editors who come up with common rules to work together though, they simply wouldn't do this by themselves if the other person doesn't ask for it.
From my experience, even in my personal work (not sending anything to any client), doing versioning is super helpful. So even before having any client it seems like basic workflow hygiene. But working with more and more people I find that no ones does that. Any idea why ?