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lowededwookie wrote:
We're simply conditioned to use extensions because it allows us to be compatible with Windows.

You can blame windows as long as you like wookie, I can't stop you

But I think a lot of people use file extensions because they're human friendly and don't require you to look at the file to find out what it is.

Trade me require my photos to be uploaded in .jpg format. I wonder if that means the file extension has to be visible in the filename, or is it enough that the format is JPEG from saving in the Appleworks menu which leaves the extension off? I guess I could experiment with this next time I'm uploading pics to tm.

As long as the format is .jpg or JPEG it should work.

Yep, just tested one without the visible suffix and it worked fine.

duck wrote:
But I think a lot of people use file extensions because they're human friendly and don't require you to look at the file to find out what it is.That's what thumbnails are for. In the old days it was the case but now with icons that show you exactly what sort of file you have the extension is kind of not required anymore.

By default though many apps do put in an extension but once again it's predominately for compatibility reasons whereas other apps don't ask you for an extension and it's up to you whether or not you want one. GIMP for instance doesn't ask you for an extension but if you do it will automatically save it as the file format of that relating to that extension. If you don't supply the extension it asks you what format you want to save the image in.

lowededwookie wrote:
That's what thumbnails are for.

Sure, if you have a GUI view of the files.

The point that I've been trying to make is that there are times you don't have a GUI view of the file - or it's an automated system where checking the file extension is the easier way to determine what a file is *likely* to be.

At those times and places file extensions are incredibly useful.