Kerry Baker wrote:I need to know the actual procedure the file system uses to delete a file.
That is, what files are modified (Inode table, SuperBlock, Group Descriptors etc) and which fields within the files are modified.
Now, I must admit that you were asking "what happens in ext2", not "what happens in general", and I can't tell you how and when ext2 decides to reuse blocks that are not referenced in the ilist ... so perhaps I haven't helped you at all ...
A little digging later reveals 'debugfs', which you might find to be interesting - it's in the efs2sprogs Debian package:
"The debugfs program is an interactive file system debugger. It can be used to examine and change the state of an ext2 file system."
-jim
