From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 To: 9fans@cse.psu.edu From: "Thomas Bushnell, BSG" Message-ID: <877kt31hm1.fsf@becket.becket.net> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii References: <20011106180734.204A4199B5@mail.cse.psu.edu> Subject: Re: [9fans] Plan 9 Date: Wed, 7 Nov 2001 09:44:27 +0000 Topicbox-Message-UUID: 18004f5c-eaca-11e9-9e20-41e7f4b1d025 presotto@closedmind.org writes: > >Right now, if I want a given file to appear *here* in my visible > >filespace, there are two ways: I can bind it, I can move/copy it. > > Making copies of something is very different than adding a new > name for it. Are you suggesting that one can get away with > one or the other? Not attacking, just trying to understand. I'm not implying that either is sufficient for the other. In Unix, say, there is this thing called a "hard link" by the masses; the cognoscenti just call it a "link". A "link" is what connects a name-in-directory to a file. Now in Unix, and in Plan 9, there are two places that links get specified. One place is in directories themselves. In Unix, it's "on disk"; in Plan 9, it's via the file protocol. The other places is in the "mount table"; in Unix there's one system-wide table; in Plan 9 there is a per-process inherited table. My idea is that these two should be unified (keep in mind I'm talking about "some future system", not suggesting a big design alteration of existing systems).