Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!dino!ux1.cso.uiuc.edu!brutus.cs.uiuc.edu!usc!dianne.usc.edu!blarson
From: blarson@dianne.usc.edu (bob larson)
Newsgroups: comp.os.os9
Subject: Re: Hard links (was Re: More on 253 error...)
Message-ID: <22630@usc.edu>
Date: 3 Feb 90 00:40:02 GMT
References: <785938944@andrew.cmu.edu> <155400003@recco>
Sender: news@usc.edu
Organization: USC AIS, Los Angeles
Lines: 53

[inews here had some problems, sorry about the delay.  Kim Kempf
basicly said the same thing already.]

Wolfgang Ocker and I seem to have different definitions of the term
"hard link".  In order to help clarify my posting, I'll give my
definition:

Hard link:   A mechinism to get multiple names to one data file that does
not give priority to any one name.  There is only one copy of the data
file actually present.

In article <155400003@recco> weo@recco.chi.sub.org (Wolfgang Ocker) writes:
>
>Unfortunately hard links are nearly useless in the current version of
>OSK RBF.

I disagree.

> It's impossible to remove (delete) a file (name) out of a
>directory when a path is open on the file itself. 

True, but I fail to see the connection between this and hard links.
In unix, you can create a file (leaving it open), delete it, write the
file, then read it back in.  The acutal contents of the file are present
until the file is closed.  In os9, you cannot delete an open file.
While the unix concept is interesting and possibly useful, it does
not (by my definition) have anything directly to do with hard links.

>So this "feature" of
>the RBF is only useful when "moving" files/directories around in the
>directory structure

and, of course, causing the same file to appear to be in several places
at once, which is what hard links are.

> (but it has nothing to do with UNIX hard links).
???


Hard links are useful wherever multiple names of a single file are needed.
News (B, C, TMNN) uses this to avoid wasting disk space on cross-posted
articles.

>|  Wolfgang Ocker          |     weo@recco.chi.sub.org     |

Ps: your posting software has a couple of bugs.  My article I.D. was not
present in the references line, and your Message-ID line was missing your
domain.

-- 
Bob Larson	blarson@dianne.usc.edu		usc!dianne!blarson
--**	To join Prime computer mailing list send mail to	**---
info-prime-request@ais1.usc.edu	  or	usc!ais1!info-prime-request