Subject: Re: ls when acl() is busy [was: ls slow on top-level directory]
From: Lasse <[email-masked]>
To: [email-masked]
Cc: [email-masked]
Date: Tue, 28 Jun 2005 22:03:25 +0200

Eric Blake wrote:
> According to Corinna Vinschen on 6/28/2005 2:34 AM:
> 
>>However, IMHO, ls should be changed to just print no error message,
>>if file_has_acl() returns -1 and errno is set to EBUSY, and the file
>>should simply be treated as a file with no ACL.  That's the least
>>intrusive way, IMHO.
> 
> Certainly less intrusive, but also potentially misleading.  The point of a
> new character is to make it obvious that ls was unable to determine if
> there are ACLs, rather than that the file has no alternate access.

IMO, it should be the other way around, i.e. no error but a '+' to
signify an ACL, for two reasons:

1. Transperency. Since the UNIX permissions are emulated, one could
argue that all files should have the '+' displayed...

2. Probability. If the file is busy there's good chance that the file
has an ACL.

I view the '+' as a reminder that "there's more to it than what is
shown" and I think that would be right thing to convey for busy files.

I think this behaviour would be the least surprising...

-- 
/Lasse

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