Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!csd4.milw.wisc.edu!uxc!uxc.cso.uiuc.edu!gistdev!flint
From: flint@gistdev.UUCP
Newsgroups: comp.bugs.sys5
Subject: Re: ulimit (was: getty/login for callba
Message-ID: <7400001@gistdev>
Date: 20 Apr 89 14:06:00 GMT
References: <19516@genrad.UUCP>
Lines: 16
Nf-ID: #R:genrad.UUCP:19516:gistdev:7400001:000:960
Nf-From: gistdev.UUCP!flint    Apr 20 09:06:00 1989


If what everyone here has been saying about the purpose of ulimit is true,
then it is "broken" under RFS.  Why?  Because it is the kernel that enforces
the ulimit, not the file system: that means that I can have two machines in
a network with file systems from each mounted on one another, let's call
them "big" and "small".  Machine "big" has a ulimit of 32767, machine "small"
still has the 1MB default ulimit because it's file systems are all 95% full.
So what happens if someone that is logged into machine "big" writes a file
into a file system that actually physically resides on "small"?  It uses the
ulimit of "big", that's what, and it fills up the file system.  Similarly,
someone logged into "small" cannot create large files on "big".

Flint Pellett, Global Information Systems Technology, Inc.
1800 Woodfield Drive, Savoy, IL  61874     (217) 352-1165
INTERNET: flint%gistdev@uxc.cso.uiuc.edu
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