Re: [RFC][PATCH] VFS interface for extended attributes

[Anton Altaparmakov]

At 00:32 13/11/01, Alexander Viro wrote:
>On Mon, 12 Nov 2001, Andreas Gruenbacher wrote:
> > There is one difference between the interfaces you are complaining about
> > above and the proposed EA interface for EA's: In those interfaces you have
> > wildcard parameters that are used for who-knows-what, depending on a
> > command-like parameter, including use as a value, use as a pointer to a
> > value/struct, etc.
>
>Yes, and?  You've got more than enough material for the same kind of
>abuse.  What's more, you _already_ have it - in some of the subfunctions
>*data is read from, in some - written to, in some - ignored.  Worse
>yet, in some subfunctions we put structured data in there, in some -
>just a chunk of something.
>
>With all that, who had said that a year down the road we won't get a
>dozen of new syscalls hiding behind that one?
>
>Sorry, folks, but idea of private extendable syscall table (per-filesystem,
>no less) doesn't look like a good thing.  That's _the_ reason why ioctl()
>is bad.

Al,

Out of interest, which access interface(s) would you like to see used?

Giving a few suggestions you would be happy with would be a lot easier on 
anyone trying to develop a filesystem API than for them having to come up 
with one after the other until one is found which you approve of... (-;

Best regards,

Anton