On 24/08/2020 18:15, Hendrik Boom wrote: > On Mon, Aug 24, 2020 at 10:43:26AM -0400, fsmithred via Dng wrote: >> On 8/24/20 10:32 AM, Hendrik Boom wrote: >>> >>> Mu memory may be failing ne after almost half a century, but I recall >>> that the original Unix, way back in the early 70's, >>> even directories could be read as files. Not that there was >>> some hidden trickery making them into files; instead there were >>> conventions how files could be treated as directories. >>> >> >> I had to look up Plan 9, and in doing so, I found that "Everything is a >> file" has its own wikipedia page. It says, "But file descriptors are also >> created for things like anonymous pipes and network sockets via different >> methods. Therefore a more accurate description of this feature is >> Everything is a file descriptor." >> >> And the page for File descriptor says, "In Unix-like systems, file >> descriptors can refer to any Unix file type named in a file system. As >> well as regular files, this includes directories, block and character >> devices (also called "special files")" > > So if we were to use fd as short for file-or-directory it could better > be short for file descriptor.
glibc API extensively uses fd to mean file descriptor. That is a data file, not a metadata directory, only the OS has business in messing with directories (filesystem metadata) not applications executed by Users other than creating\deleting and setting permissions. refer to: 'man 3 fdopen' 'man 2 open' (also covers 'dirfd') > > -- hendrik > _______________________________________________ > Dng mailing list > Dng@lists.dyne.org > https://mailinglists.dyne.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/dng > _______________________________________________ Dng mailing list Dng@lists.dyne.org https://mailinglists.dyne.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/dng