Does anyone remember Servant by Andy Hertzfeld? Which kind of blended the Finder with ResEdit, showing the resources just like it shows folders and files. Allowing to manipulate them the same way, for example copying via drag'n'drop etc.
> The sheer oddity + lack of real world example code floating around made it feel impenetrable
not sure if I understand you, but you have the code of the whole system at your fingertips. Which is certainly "real world" because you are running it :)
http://bitsavers.org/pdf/apple/mac/Servant_A_New_Shell_for_t...