On Sat, 27 Apr 2024 at 14:11, Al Viro <viro@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote: > > ... eliminating the need to reopen block devices so they could be > exclusively held. This looks like a good change, but it raises the question of why we did it this odd way to begin with? Is it just because O_EXCL without O_CREAT is kind of odd, and only has meaning for block devices? Or is it just that before we used fiel pointers for block devices, the old model made more sense? Anyway, I like it, it just makes me go "why didn't we do it that way originally?" Linus