Path: utzoo!utgpu!utstat!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!rutgers!apple!ames!lll-winken!uunet!auspex!guy
From: guy@auspex.auspex.com (Guy Harris)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.wizards
Subject: Re: What kinds of things would you want in the GNU OS?
Keywords: GNU OS features kernel fun!
Message-ID: <1749@auspex.auspex.com>
Date: 5 Jun 89 19:14:07 GMT
References: <9402@alice.UUCP> <443@logicon.arpa>
Reply-To: guy@auspex.auspex.com (Guy Harris)
Organization: Auspex Systems, Santa Clara
Lines: 21

>How does the kernel become more complicated just because file names
>can be 255 characters long instead of 14?  Just change a #define'd
>constant and away you go.

Assuming the extra space taken up by 258-byte (or 260-byte) directory
entries - or the extra time it takes to zip through the bigger
directories - isn't a problem.  I guess Kirk McKusick thought they
*were* a problem, and added a more complicated scheme to permit
variable-length directory entries. 

>Considering that C provides poor support for character strings that may
>or may not be null-terminated (the format in which the short filenames
>are stored), the Berkeley directory format may actually result in a
>simpler kernel!

Well, it *didn't* result in a simpler kernel.  The added complication of
dealing with "null-or-size-terminated strings" is pretty minimal.

I like long file names, too, but you *do* have to admit that the BSD
file system's directory-handling code is more complicated, in part, due
to the more complicated directory entry structure.