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From: vlcek@athena.mit.edu (Jim C Vlcek)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.aix
Subject: behavior of file(1) in AIX PS/2 v1.1
Message-ID: <1990Sep22.230113.14094@athena.mit.edu>
Date: 22 Sep 90 23:01:13 GMT
Sender: daemon@athena.mit.edu (Mr Background)
Organization: Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Lines: 37

I'm running AIX PS/2 v1.1 on a Model 80, and noticed a rather
disturbing thing: file(1) changes the "change" time on files if the
user is the owner of those files.  To wit:

% ls
foo.c
% stat foo.c
Filename: foo.c
Size in bytes: 91               Size in Blocks: 0
File-Type: Regular File         mode:(0600) -rw-------
Owned By User: vlcek (200),     Group: staff (1)
dev = 2  inode = 227     links = 1
Access: Fri Sep 21 00:03:26 1990
Modify: Fri Sep 21 00:03:15 1990
Change: Fri Sep 21 00:03:15 1990
% date ; file foo.c
Sat Sep 22 17:58:06 EDT 1990
foo.c:          c program text
% stat foo.c
Filename: foo.c
Size in bytes: 91               Size in Blocks: 0
File-Type: Regular File         mode:(0600) -rw-------
Owned By User: vlcek (200),     Group: staff (1)
dev = 2  inode = 227     links = 1
Access: Fri Sep 21 00:03:26 1990
Modify: Fri Sep 21 00:03:15 1990
Change: Sat Sep 22 17:58:06 1990

I'm sure this is not the intended behavior (it doesn't do it on the
4.3BSD systems I work on).  Someone please tell me this is fixed in v1.2?

Also, I've noticed that file chokes on sockets, returning a "cannot
open for reading" error.  Come on, guys, if it's a socket, it's
identified as such right in the mode bits, you don't _need_ to open it
for reading!

Jim Vlcek  (vlcek@caf.mit.edu  vlcek@athena.mit.edu)