"element" is the core concept of Element Desktop.
With this concept, you can manage all your electronic belongings in an orgnized, fully customized, gradually improving way.

An "element" is a directory with description file "element.ini".
It can represent anything, with arbitrary classification method.
User will read/view/use it frequently, but edit it seldomly, so they can view the element as a whole and pay little attention to the its content.

Story 1:

I manage all my movies as "movie elements".
I use application "elem-totem" to play them. What I do is to select the element directory and it plays.
my movies have different video format, like *.avi, *.mkv or *.rmvb, but it doesn't borther me since the only thing comes into my eye is the element directory, it's a 
consistent, perfect view.
As time passes by, I get larger hard disk and the bluray version of some movies, I can put *.ts files beside the original *.rmvb file. But it puts no change in my 
opertaion as a user, still simply select the element directory.
"elem-totem" should decide which format should be used.
"elem-sync" should decide what part of this movie element should be copied to the smartphone.
"elem-browser" should give me a suitable preview for this movie element.