Reading directories (was: Re: directory copying with cp; broken?)

[Guy Harris]

> (Actually, the long-term answer is that directory reading really ought to
> go via the kernel so that a standard interface to different kinds of file
> systems can be provided,

In SunOS since SunOS release 2.0 (as well as, I suspect, many UNIX
systems that have picked up NFS), and in System V Release 3 and later
versions, it does precisely that, using "getdirentries" in SunOS prior
to 4.0 and "getdents" in S5R3 and SunOS 4.0.  Programs shouldn't use
those calls directly, of course; they should use "readdir".