From mboxrd@z Thu Jan  1 00:00:00 1970
To: 9fans@cse.psu.edu
Date: Mon, 20 Aug 2007 14:29:38 +0000
From: "Douglas A. Gwyn" <DAGwyn@null.net>
Message-ID: <46C9A3E8.5A6BE67D@null.net>
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Subject: Re: [9fans] everything is a directory
Topicbox-Message-UUID: ad1d86c4-ead2-11e9-9d60-3106f5b1d025

I was thinking more about the subject, and extended attributes.
Here is an alternative proposal to implement extended attributes:

(1) Everything stays the same as it is (Plan 9 or old-Unix)
except:
(2) An attempt to read(2) or write(2) a directory will succeed
if and only if there is a .data entry, in which case it will
access contents of the .data object.

None of the existing tools need to be changed.

To add attributes (all done in user space):
(a) Move the current file (terminal node) to a temp name.
(b) Make a directory in its place, with the original name.
(c) Move the temp name to original_name/.data .
(d) Create a file (subdirectory?) .attributes .
(e) Populate the .attributes .