Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.2 9/3/84; site talcott.UUCP Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!allegra!mit-eddie!think!harvard!talcott!tmb From: tmb@talcott.UUCP (Thomas M. Breuel) Newsgroups: net.unix-wizards Subject: Re: Re: inode number -> pathname? (4.2BSD) Message-ID: <468@talcott.UUCP> Date: Thu, 11-Jul-85 23:35:57 EDT Article-I.D.: talcott.468 Posted: Thu Jul 11 23:35:57 1985 Date-Received: Sat, 13-Jul-85 12:09:23 EDT References: <11465@brl-tgr.ARPA> Organization: Harvard University Lines: 18 > I disagree! If it were possible to set the current working directory > to a given inode and device, then pwd would give you the answer. All > the permission information, and even the bit denoting whether or not > this inode refers to a directory is stored in the inode, and can easily > be checked in such a call. Putting such a call in would be easy. Just > do what "chdir" (well, actually "chdirec" in 4.2) does after it calls > "nami". Why is this hard? > > William LeFebvre That's probably not a good idea. Many people/programs rely on the fact that files within or below an inaccessible directory are inaccessible regardless of their modes. Although there is in principle nothing wrong with the idea of introducing a set of system calls that work by inode rather than by name, it is incompatible with current habits and uses of the file system. Thomas.