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Path: sserve!newshost.anu.edu.au!harbinger.cc.monash.edu.au!bunyip.cc.uq.oz.au!munnari.oz.au!spool.mu.edu!howland.reston.ans.net!wupost!gumby!yale!yale!yale.edu!xlink.net!rz.uni-karlsruhe.de!news.uni-stuttgart.de!news.belwue.de!zib-berlin.de!ceres.fokus.gmd.de!nntp.gmd.de!Germany.EU.net!EU.net!uunet!rwwa.com!not-for-mail From: witr@rwwa.com (Robert Withrow) Newsgroups: comp.os.386bsd.bugs Subject: /proc filesystem strangeness Date: 5 May 1994 08:55:56 -0400 Organization: R.W. Withrow Associates Lines: 29 Message-ID: <2qaqct$ick@meatball.rwwa.com> Reply-To: witr@rwwa.com NNTP-Posting-Host: meatball.rwwa.com I sent the following as a bug, but I am not familiar with the semantics of the /proc filesystem outside of SVR4. Can others familiar with these semantics on other OSes comment? This releates to 1.1-GAMMA. Here are several things that seem ``wrong'' with the FreeBSD /proc filesystem. But then I don't have a ``spec''. On FreeBSD A ``cat /proc/NNN >/dev/null'' generally continues forever. Doing the same on a SVR4 /proc fs comes back immediatly. Seems like the latter is more ``correct'' behavior. On FreeBSD a ``strings /proc/NNN'' will generally complete on the same file that a ``cat'' won't. This seems ``strange''. Also, on SVR4, the permissions on the files on the /proc FS are 0600, whereas on FreeBSD they are 0644. I think the former is more correct. Also, on SVR4, the files are named, for example, /proc/00060 whereas on FreeBSD they are /proc/60. I think the former is better. -- Robert Withrow, Tel: +1 617 598 4480, Fax: +1 617 598 4430 R.W. Withrow Associates, 319 Lynnway, Lynn MA 01901 USA, Net: witr@rwwa.COM