Re: silent semantic changes with reiser4

Hans Reiser
2004-08-30T07:47:32Z

I think we have to either:

1) Link only to the file and not the directory in the file-directory
duality. This means we change the semantics of hard link so that it only
links to the data and the standard metadata, and the optional
attributes/streams/files-in-directory are not seen by the second link.
You can think of this as meaning that hard links only connect to the
file and not the directory in the file-directory wave-particle duality

or, 2) we should ask Alexander Smith to help with applying the graph
traversal cycle detection code that he wrote.

I can go either way contentedly for now. 2) is the right long term
solution. 1) is probably the right short term solution.

Ok, Linus and Viro, now I see why it was hard. Being able to effectively
connect to compound documents only with symlinks is a bit distasteful,
but it is quite livable, and I very much hope you decide it is better
than fragmenting the namespace.

Hans