Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!uwm.edu!cs.utexas.edu!usc!apple!zorba!dtynan From: cudcv@cu.warwick.ac.uk (Rob McMahon) Newsgroups: comp.unix Subject: Re: An idea probably discarded many times Message-ID: <3524@zorba.Tynan.COM> Date: 26 Nov 89 20:15:58 GMT References: <3481@zorba.Tynan.COM> <3495@zorba.Tynan.COM> <3508@zorba.Tynan.COM> Sender: dtynan@zorba.Tynan.COM Reply-To: Rob McMahon Organization: Computing Services, Warwick University, UK Lines: 25 Approved: dtynan@zorba.Tynan.COM In article <3508@zorba.Tynan.COM> uunet!convex.COM!tchrist (Tom Christiansen) writes: >In article <3495@zorba.Tynan.COM> larry@macom1.UUCP (Larry Taborek) writes: >>Processes in Unix are alot like files though, they have user and >>group permissions just like files. > >untrue. process groups are more analogous to directory sub-trees than >to group id's. I'm not completely convinced by this, processes have a very obvious parent/ child/sibling relationship, and presumably Larry was talking about the effective (or real ?) group id of the process, rather than it's process group. It does bring up an interesting point about /proc, though: what does the directory structure look like ? It would seem to be logical and useful to have it organised as a tree, with childless processes appearing as files, and those with children appearing as directories, with their children as entries. It might require you to be able to open a `directory' for writing, is this a per-filesystem attribute, or would this cause any problems ? Rob -- UUCP: ...!mcvax!ukc!warwick!cudcv PHONE: +44 203 523037 JANET: cudcv@uk.ac.warwick ARPA: cudcv@warwick.ac.uk Rob McMahon, Computing Services, Warwick University, Coventry CV4 7AL, England