On Monday 16 May 2005 12:01 pm, Wade Preston Shearer wrote: > > It's possible the following occured: > > > > * Editor is given a file name to edit, say "foo". > > > > * Editor moves the file of that name to a backup file name, say > > "foo~". > > > > * Editor now opens (creates) a new file with the original name. > > > > It's a common algorithm for Mess-DOS editors, but it breaks on most > > Unix file systems and NTFS precisely because it ignores the side > > effects for both symlinks and hard links. If that's the case, you have > > a bug in your editor.
This 'copy-on-write' behavior is useful in some cases. The Arch can keep revisions in a library and hard link checkouts instead of copying, increasing speed of checkouts. To edit that tree without corrupting the library, you want to break that hard link on write. Emacs and vim both have modes that will do this for you: breaking the hard link on write. .===================================. | This has been a P.L.U.G. mailing. | | Don't Fear the Penguin. | | IRC: #utah at irc.freenode.net | `==================================='
