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From: boyd@basser.oz (Boyd Roberts)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.wizards
Subject: Re: /bin/test and stat(2)
Message-ID: <1036@basser.oz>
Date: Mon, 5-Oct-87 21:54:01 EDT
Article-I.D.: basser.1036
Posted: Mon Oct  5 21:54:01 1987
Date-Received: Fri, 9-Oct-87 04:42:18 EDT
References: <9479@brl-adm.ARPA> <29056@sun.uucp> <15069@topaz.rutgers.edu>
Reply-To: boyd@basser.oz (Boyd Roberts)
Organization: Dept of Comp Sci, Uni of Sydney, Australia
Lines: 20

In article <15069@topaz.rutgers.edu> ron@topaz.rutgers.edu (Ron Natalie) writes:
>STAT should never be called with NULL, but it should always work
>when called with a zero length string (e.g. "").
>
>-Ron

Well, I agree with not passing stat() NULL, that's EFAULT city!

As for "", I couldn't disagree more.  The zero length string only
works due to a quirk in namei().  Do you ever see the ``zero length string''
named file in a directory?  No, you don't.  But you do see ``.'' & ``..'' etc.

Say what you mean.  If you want ``.'' then say it.  I see ``.'' in every
directory.  But, I've never seen the ``zero length string''.



Boyd Roberts			boyd@basser.oz

``When the going gets wierd, the wierd turn pro...''