Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!cs.utexas.edu!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!ucbvax!POSTGRES.BERKELEY.EDU!dillon
From: dillon@POSTGRES.BERKELEY.EDU (Matt Dillon)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.tech
Subject: Re: filesystem links (was: yet another 1.4 request)
Message-ID: <8906300334.AA12228@postgres.Berkeley.EDU>
Date: 30 Jun 89 03:34:44 GMT
Sender: daemon@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU
Lines: 34

:
:$ There's a clear need for both hard and soft links, and someone who hasn't
:$ used both kinds in the past probably won't clearly understand why, 
:
:The problem is that there is a seperate file system process for each
:mounted device on the Amiga, Doug, so it's hard to do cross-device
:links (all that DOS is, for the most part, is a converter that turns
:your requests into messages to send to the Dos-handler or filesystem).

	As one who has fooled around with filesystems a bit this is not
    difficult to do.  The only really sticky part with file handler processes
    is how to deal with ExNext(), and this doesn't come up when you implement
    soft links.

	Routing DOS request packets between filesystem processes is easy.

    From using soft links and hard links in UNIX systems it is clear that
    soft links are much more useful.

:As for hard links -- in Unix terms, the filename is in the inode under
:AmigaDOS. That means you'd have to put the filename somewhere else if
:you wanted hard links. That sounds pretty reasonable, actually, if you

	The problem with hard links on the Amiga is that the filename is
    part of the file header (the 'inode').  On UNIX systems the filename 
    is part of the directory entry and not associated with the inode.

    Thus, however hard links are implemented on the Amiga it will be a 
    big hack.  I strongly suggest to C-A that they forget hard links 
    entirely and implement softlinks (which they can do in a day).

:    Eric Lee Green              P.O. Box 92191, Lafayette, LA 70509     

				-Matt