Will SharePoint Replace Windows Explorer?

This is a question I ask myself a lot. Will Microsoft eventully use SharePoint as the default method of browsing your desktop? As a user I prefer a common interface, I like the KISS method. So I would approve of it. As SharePoint intergrates with office more and more, I can't help to wonder why they would not take it a step further and make the transition complete: become fully integrated with Windows. Maybe it is my SharePoint bias talking, but I for one will not be surprised (I may even be happy... if not because it is useful but because it will be a validation of my forsight) if a couple versions down the road Windows is completely SharePoint based.

Now from a technical perspective I start to ask myself some questions: how efficient would it be? is it even possible? is it worth the reward (if any)? would it make sense to do it? I get mixed feelings at this level partly because I am not aware of many of the issues involved but also because I often come up with crazy ideas that I think are great, but others don't seem to share my enthousiasm. Why would microsoft have a SQL Server based system sitting atop NTFS? Why have users access their files through a database if they can just get them directly? Did Vista not improve search enough? Are search an indexing really that much better? Maybe not.

However I still remain optimistic about the idea of SharePoint managing your windows files and this is why. I personally do not like directory based file systems. They are great because there are logical paths to documents. Super! But what about the file that could logically exist in more than one place? What if documents could be tagged? Well metadata is the basis for WinFS an operating system based on relational databases. So now your files are all at the same level, allowing users more flexibility to create personalized views... which happens to be one of the great features of SharePoint, which (may I remind you is built on the Microsoft relational database: SQL Server). So now to find out if my profecy will materialize, I will just have to either "wait and see" or I can start researching. I think I'll stick to whatever requires less effort.