Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rpi!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!sample.eng.ohio-state.edu!purdue!haven.umd.edu!decuac!hussar.dco.dec.com!mjr From: mjr@hussar.dco.dec.com (Marcus J. Ranum) Newsgroups: comp.unix.wizards Subject: Re: file attributes Message-ID: <1991Jun25.012950.23810@decuac.dec.com> Date: 25 Jun 91 01:29:50 GMT References: <1781@sranha.sra.co.jp> Organization: Lines: 21 erik@srava.sra.co.jp (Erik M. van der Poel) writes: >The reason I brought this up in comp.unix.wizards, is because I want >to discuss how we could integrate this metadata idea into Unix. The first step is to discuss possible options, and to try to abstract a general solution. It's not a question of "how we could[...]" it's a question of "should we[...]?" and whether it needs to be integrated into UNIX or application layer, or whatnot. I don't think the justifications you've given for why we *need* a new system call are very clear or very solid. The "how" and the "getting it into POSIX" part come later. (Unless you're one of the increasing population that seems to feel that standards should be set in concrete without a decent set of trial implementations and some discussion - if you are, I can't help you). Barry Shein's idea of environment variables for files is extremely elegant and would probably be useful in a lot of ways - it would rightly require that the application have "brains" about file types, rather than the kernel, but would make it a lot easier for them to do so. mjr.