The naming of at()s is a difficult matter

["H. Peter Anvin" <hpa@zytor.com>]

I have noticed that the new ...at() system calls are named in what
appears to be a completely haphazard fashion.  In Unix system calls,
an f- prefix means it operates on a file descriptor; the -at suffix (a
prefix would have been more consistent, but oh well) similarly
indicates it operates on a (directory fd, pathname) pair.

However, some system calls, in particular fchownat, futimesat,
fchmodat and faccessat add the f- prefix for what appears to be
absolutely no good reason.  Logically, these system calls should be
named chownat, utimesat, chmodat, and accessat.

I understand some of this braindamage comes from Solaris, but some of
these calls do not.  We should avoid it if at all possible, and I
would recommend at least introducing aliases with the sane names.

         -hpa