Re: inode allocation

On Mon, Oct 27, 2003 at 07:43:26PM +0000, Drew P. Vogel wrote:
> Currently inodes are allocated in a way that a file created will be
> assigned the inode of the last file removed, assuming no other files have
> been created since the file was removed.

No, not necessarily.  The first free inode in the block group of the
containing directory is used.  This might or might not be the inode of
the last file removed.

> In shell scrict terms, after running this:
> 
> touch file
> a=`stat -c %i file`
> rm file
> touch file
> b=`stat -c %i file`
> 
> $a eq $b. This makes it difficult to determine if those two files are
> different. Is this goal of the design or just a side-effect?

It's not a goal, but inode numbers were not intended to be used to
assure file uniqueness.  Exactly what is the high-level problem you
are trying to solve?

                                                - Ted


-------------------------------------------------------
This SF.net email is sponsored by: The SF.net Donation Program.
Do you like what SourceForge.net is doing for the Open
Source Community?  Make a contribution, and help us add new
features and functionality. Click here: http://sourceforge.net/donate/