directory handling in ansi C

[Henry Spencer]

In article <13288 at s.ms.uky.edu> beech at ms.uky.edu (Wayne Beech) writes:
>Does anyone know the rationale behind not specifically defining a set of
>functions to work with directories in ansi C...

The very concept of "directory" is not portable, never mind the set of
operations you can perform on one.

X3J11 decided early that (with the exception of the free-standing/hosted
split) it did *not* want a standard with multiple levels or optional
parts.  Ignoring the free-standing business, there is *one* C standard.
This is a Good Thing.  It did limit the committee to providing only
functions that could be implemented on an enormous range of systems,
however.
-- 
A bit of tolerance is worth a  |     Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology
megabyte of flaming.           | uunet!attcan!utzoo!henry henry at zoo.toronto.edu