Re: Can't hardlink in different dirs. (BUG#826)

Richard Gooch (rgooch@ras.ucalgary.ca)
Fri, 3 Dec 1999 15:31:56 -0700


Andrea Arcangeli writes:
> On Fri, 3 Dec 1999, Alexander Viro wrote:
>
> >... and F- on UNIX SA 101 - if you don't know the reasons to keep /tmp on
> >a separate filesystem.
>
> Would you call this a solution? This is a very ugly workaround. The
> fact this works is only a side effect of the limitations of the
> hardlink.

The reason for having /tmp on a different FS is not to prevent
hardlinks. Personally, I'd find it convenient if hardlinks worked
across filesystems (no, I'm not advocating changing this, before you
start implying that I'm advocating this because I don't understand how
hard links are implemented).

No, the reason for having /tmp on a separate FS is so that damage to
/tmp (which you don't care about) can't affect /. The more you write
to a FS, the more chance you have of damaging it, even parts that you
don't write to.

And I don't want any pseudo-theoretical statement that writing to one
part of the FS won't affect another (static) part of the FS. In real
life we have hardware and software bugs, and what may seem fine in an
ideal world is far from optimal in reality.

Regards,

Richard....
Permanent: rgooch@atnf.csiro.au
Current: rgooch@ras.ucalgary.ca

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