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From: zink@bunker.UUCP (David Zink)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.wizards
Subject: Re: symbolic links are a botch
Message-ID: <2249@bunker.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 25-Jun-87 10:42:23 EDT
Article-I.D.: bunker.2249
Posted: Thu Jun 25 10:42:23 1987
Date-Received: Sat, 27-Jun-87 01:55:06 EDT
References: <7955@brl-adm.ARPA>
Reply-To: zink@bunker.UUCP (David Zink)
Organization: Bunker Ramo an Olivetti Company, Shelton CT
Lines: 33

>   In article <2211@bunker.UUCP>, zink@bunker.UUCP (David Zink) writes:
>   > What's wrong about more than eight symbolic loops?

I meant links! eight symbolic links!

And thanx all who resp'd as I had never run into
ln -s a a
before, but I still don't understand why after
ln -s a b
ln -s b c
ln -s c d
ln -s d e
ln -s e f
ln -s f g
ln -s g h
ln -s h i
,
echo > i
	should fail?

As I stumble through the code of various applications and operating systems
I am continually appalled by the number of hard-coded constants:
# of file descriptors, # of signals, # of characters in a filename or path.

As unix matures it tends to slowly expand these numbers, and probably eventually
make them indefinite. Unfortunately what usually happens is that the upper
bound is what some person or group considered the largest sensible number.

Why is it that at this late date people are still coding itty bitty constants
like 8 into the kernal?

I guess that my major complaint is that ELOOP purports to mean LOOP but
really means EIGHT.