bugtraq - Re: Changes to the filesystem while find is running

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Message-ID: <BB481F17-3F0C-11D9-A47C-000D93558196@greatcircle.com>
Date: Thu, 25 Nov 2004 10:06:29 -0800
From: Elizabeth Zwicky <zwicky@...atcircle.com>
To: James Youngman <bugtraq@...ession.spiral-arm.org>
Cc: srevilak@...akeasy.net, Casper.Dik@....COM, parimiv@...haw.com,
	Martin Buchholz <Martin.Buchholz@....COM>,
	levon@...ementarian.org, bugtraq@...urityfocus.com, bug-findutils@....org
Subject: Re: Changes to the filesystem while find is running - comments?



On Nov 24, 2004, at 4:15 AM, James Youngman wrote:

> On Wed, Nov 24, 2004 at 08:51:38AM +0100, Casper.Dik@....COM wrote:
>> But PATH_MAX is limited and the number of file descriptors is perhaps
>> not.
>
> Systems differ.  Some have no limits on the depth of a directory
> hierarchy.  Certainly I've created directory hierarchies of over
> 800,000 levels on HP-UX 9 and on Linux.  GNU Hurd has no limits at all
> (and therefore used not to #define PATH_MAX at all).
>
PATH_MAX is not a limit on the depth of a directory hierarchy; standard 
versions
of UNIX have no such limits. PATH_MAX limits the length of a path 
passed to
the kernel in a single call, but that can be a relative path. Many 
programs
limit the lengths of the path they will deal with to PATH_MAX, but in
general this is only a way of simplifying the problem; you could write 
the program
to use relative paths and ignore PATH_MAX. PATH_MAX is relevant here 
only
because the standard allows you to give up there.

	Elizabeth Zwicky
	zwicky@...h.org