On 19:41 08 Feb 2003, Jeremy Fitzhardinge <jeremy@goop.org> wrote: | On Sat, 2003-02-08 at 16:57, Andrew Morton wrote: | > The Open Group base specification 6 says: | > | > "If the old argument and the new argument resolve to the same existing file, | > rename() shall return successfully and perform no other action." | > | > http://www.opengroup.org/onlinepubs/007904975/functions/rename.html | | Seems to be an ambiguous to me. I would interpret that to mean that if | old and new ended up referring to the same direntry in the same | directory then there should be no operation, rather than two entries | pointing to the same inode. Hm, their definition of "file" does seem to | mean the inode, which makes rename's behaviour a bit counter-intuitive | here. Counterintuitive but "correct". It's surprisingly hard to unambiguously sy what we all would probably prefer: that only when the paths resolve to the same file _and_ final filename should no action occur (I'd rather some kind of E* return myself, but no matter). The guys in the open group aren't idiots or fascists. Bear in mind that this check could be pretty hard to do. I've used the phrase "same file _and_ final filename" up there, but "final filename" is very vague; a precise wording that protected rename("x","x") and rename("path1/to/x","path1/to/x") but allowed rename("x","y") for the "right" cases might be very tricky, and then there's the issue of implementation; the simple "inodes match" check is very easy and portable. Cheers, -- Cameron Simpson, DoD#743 cs@zip.com.au http://www.zip.com.au/~cs/ We would've believed it was an accidental shooting if he hadn't changed magazines ......TWICE - suicide@will.apana.org.au _______________________________________________ Ext3-users@redhat.com https://listman.redhat.com/mailman/listinfo/ext3-users
