UNIX Articles : File Descriptor and Inodes

By : syn1988@sdf.lonestar.org

While filesystems and the kernel functions handling them can vary widely from one UNIX system to another, they must always provide at least the following attributes, which are specified in the POSIX standard :

• File Type
• Number of hard links associated with the file
• File length in bytes
• Device ID (i.e., an identifier of the device containing the file)
• Inode number that identifies the file within the filesystem
• User ID of the file owner
• Group ID of the file
• Several timestamps that specify the inode status change time, the last access time, and the last modify time
• Access rights and file mode