What kinds of things would you want in the GNU OS?

[Peter da Silva]

In article <16607 at rpp386.Dallas.TX.US>, jfh at rpp386.Dallas.TX.US (John F. Haugh II) writes:
> The modification to the directory is very atomic, whereas the
> modification to a regular file is not.  The file is not locked automagically
> as is the case with directories.

Yes, I realise that this would be a problem with read-modify-write. but
the application in question didn't sound like it needed that... all it
needed was append (supported) and atomic reads/writes (supported) to maintain
consistency.

Can you see any case where a file open with O_APPEND could get out of
sync, when you're doing reads and writes that are known to be atomic
(that is, don't cross block boundaries)?
-- 
Peter da Silva, Xenix Support, Ferranti International Controls Corporation.

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