From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 From: Peter Foldiak Subject: Re: file as a directory Date: Mon, 29 Nov 2004 22:59:31 +0000 Message-ID: <41ABA9D3.7020602@st-andrews.ac.uk> References: <200411292120.iATLKZxE004233@laptop11.inf.utfsm.cl> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Return-path: list-help: list-unsubscribe: list-post: Errors-To: flx@namesys.com In-Reply-To: <200411292120.iATLKZxE004233@laptop11.inf.utfsm.cl> List-Id: Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"; format="flowed" To: Horst von Brand Cc: Christian Mayrhuber , reiserfs-list@namesys.com, Hans Reiser , Paolo Ciarrocchi , linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org Horst von Brand wrote: >Now think about files with other formats, for instance the (in)famous >sendmail.cf, or less structured stuff like you find in /etc/init.d/, or >just Postgres databases (with fun stuff like permissions on records and >fields)... or just people groping in /etc/passwd wanting to find the whole >entry (not just one field), or perhaps look at the 15th character of the >entry for John Doe. > >This way lies utter madness (what format description should be applied to >what file this time around?). Plus shove all this garbage into the kernel?! > > I was suggesting this idea mainly form XML files, where the tags define the parts clearly. In addition, I was suggesting that some of the XPath syntax (normally used for within-XML selection) could be extended above the file level into the file system. The problems you mention are all related to non-XML file format issues, which was only a minor comment in parenthesis in my original mail. I am happy to do it only for XML to begin with (and if possible later see if it can be done for SOME non-XML formats). Peter