Re: Redundant syscalls?

Doug McNaught (doug@wireboard.com)
15 Feb 2002 12:00:51 -0500


Lorenzo Allegrucci <l.allegrucci@tiscalinet.it> writes:

> I was wondering why do we need fsetxattr(2), fgetxattr(2) etc when we
> already have setxattr(2), getxattr(2) etc working on file names
> instead of file descriptors.
> truncate(2)/ftruncate(2) is another more traditional example.

Because you can't reliably derive a file name from an open file
descriptor, so it's useful to have a way to act on the file directly
through the descriptor.

-Doug

-- 
Let us cross over the river, and rest under the shade of the trees.
   --T. J. Jackson, 1863
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