Good to hear @KdeB!
A bit of background:
Most operating systems pack a file into a big block of data, containing everything needed by an application to read the file and the data within the next time you open it.
macOS does this too, but offers an alternative to this in the form of bundles. A bundle is a directory, containing several files and a “table of contents” (contents.plist) that lists what’s inside the bundle, what it does and what has changed. Contents.plist also assigns a key to all the files, so the asociated app can keep track of everything in the bundle.
If you right click on an RWC file (when stored on your mac) and then select “Show package content” you’ll see what I mean - a bunch of subdirectories, files and the content.plist file.
You can also right click, then choose “Show package content” on any apps in the Apps folder on your Mac, which will reveal a similar structure.
This is what the contents of a typical bundle (in this case an old RapidWeaver project) looks like:
And this is a snippet of that project’s contents.plist:
So this bundle is a directory, but is shown as a file. Double click it, and the bundle will open in the associated app like it was a normal file.
The bundle principle is not common among operating systems. Windows and Unix/Linux don’t have something similar at all. Only NeXTStep (one of macOS ancestors) and Commodore’s AmigaOS (1985) have a similar structure. So it’s really no surprise that most cloud storage providers don’t take the existance of bundles into account.
And this is where the trouble starts. Depending on the solution, files may be split from the rest of the bundle internally (without you noticing or agreeing to it) to save storage space on the actual hard drive that stores your date in the data center, or to save on the amount of data that has to be moved back and forth between you and the provider.
Of course Apple’s iCloud does work with bundles.
Cheers,
Erwin
