File checker: A summary

[Leslie Mikesell]

In article <8807221517.aa00760 at SEM.BRL.ARPA> @cam-cl.UUCP writes:
>> Subject: File checker
>> Is there a free utility that reads a file containing a list of files
>> and their modes/owners/groups, compares them to the actual files, and
>> either reports the inconsistencies or corrects them?  Just thought I'd
>> check before I re-invent.
>
I need two similar programs:
 1) something that will take a list of directories and list each with
the mod time of the most recently changed regular file underneath it.
It would be nice if it also compared these to a list stored in a file,
but that part would be easy to add.  This would be a quick check to
see if any archive copies are out of date.  I tend to compress/uncompress
files and move them around too much to tell anything by directory dates.

 2) something that will give the effect of "find dir -newer file -print",
but would catch files where the creation time is newer but the last
modification time is not.  I realize that is an odd condition, but the
AT&T starlan DOS server sets the mod time according to the PC clock which
is often not correct causing files to be missed in an incremental backup
based on find -newer.  The inode change time and last access time are
set from the unix clock, though, so reporting any files where the inode
change or the file modification time was later than the comparison file
should work.  A similar problem exists across RFS mounts also, but there
is no easy fix for that, other than keeping the clocks in sync, since
all three times are affected.

Les Mikesell