Sorry for the "convoluted style", James - perhaps it stems from trying not to get entagled with terms I'm not too sure about.
And yes, this is how I see it too: > if the user mounts the CDROM, then navigates into the > /whatever/cdrom directory using MC, then exits MC (F10), the OS will > continue to "think" the cdrom is being accessed... > So, while there's no process running that's actively trying to access the > cdrom (not one that the user can find, anyway), the computer/OS acts as > though there is such a process tying up the cdrom, and therefore won't > allow the user to umount/eject the media. I'm searching for a good "visual" analogy - maybe fishing from a boat could be, the boat being the "user" floating on the "System" waters, the rod the "application": Usually, you would anchor somewhere, cast with the rod, and draw whatever is hooked towards the boat; the boat wouldn't move. Not so in Linux waters - if the bait is hooked (most probably on the branch of a file-tree under the surface, <bg>) the boat is drawn there and "anchored" _there_. So you're not allowed to cut that submarine branch - this would set the boat adrift -, you first have to lift the anchor and fasten the boat elsewhere. And someone else may be fishing there too, and having been hooked up at the same invisible branch. So this "user" has to move his booat too first, before you may take a dive and tear the dang branch out of the water to recover your precious bait. Maybe someone else finds a better formulation - the point is that in *nixish systems there's no difference between "current" and "working" directory. The (part the user may use of the) whole OS "moves to" the (sub)dir where some task is done. As a "device" - at the surface - is treated the same way like a (data) file or a directory, the boat/user must get off from there first before it can be unmounted. // Heimo Claasen // <hammer at revobild dot net> // Brussels 2003-07- The WebPlace of ReRead - and much to read ==> http://www.revobild.net - To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe linux-newbie" in the body of a message to [EMAIL PROTECTED] More majordomo info at http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html Please read the FAQ at http://www.linux-learn.org/faqs
