Subj : Re: Idea: Filesystem signals
To   : comp.os.linux
From : Sybren Stuvel
Date : Sat Aug 21 2004 06:04 pm

Adam enlightened us with:
> Some file managers do reflect the changes automatically; but it's my
> guess that these programs continually poll the currently displayed
> directory every second or so to see whether it has changed.

Most of them use famd, the File Alteration Monitor Daemon.

> I'm wondering what people think of following idea.  Whenever a file
> in the computer's filesystem is changed, a signal is sent to all
> processes.  Maybe best is for the signal to include (somehow) the
> specific file that was modified.

Crap. I don't want to slow down each and every process in my computer
whenever any file changes. Most processes don't even want to be
notified of this. Others can use famd.

Sybren
-- 
The problem with the world is stupidity. Not saying there should be a
capital punishment for stupidity, but why don't we just take the
safety labels off of everything and let the problem solve itself?

.