5 ms·

Only on Linux, and not everyone who uses Unix uses Linux.

anonacct37 6y ago
I actually had to recover a deleted file on OSX once. I sure wished the proc filesystem was present there. I ended up using gdb (or maybe lldb I don't recall) to load a shared object that did a seek()/open()/copy(). Totally hacky but it worked!
btilly 6y ago
Actually /proc was invented on Solaris in the mid-90s. However this story took place on DEC Unix about 10 years earlier. So /proc was not available.
- anthk 6y ago
  False, from plan9.
  - wizzwizz4 6y ago
    Like with Euler, we generally credit the first one to do it after Plan9.
userbinator 6y ago
...and Windows won't let you delete a file that's still in use, so this scenario can't happen.
- Tsiklon 6y ago
  That is also problematic - and if I recall correctly partly one of the reasons behind why windows requires restarts so frequently when software updates are on the table.
  - mjevans 6y ago
    Yes, that is indeed the major pain. Unix-likes have an actual VFS as an API and it happens (at least on every unix-like I've worked on for any bit of time, which is mostly Linux but I expect BSD has it as well) to allow for comparatively wondrous workflows. Windows programs also often only support 'CDs' (ISO9660 / UDF), FAT, NTFS, and maybe SMB/CIFS (Samba / CIFS) network shares. Since Windows lacks (or at least historically lacked) a general VFS they could target. That's why any actual VFS that ever gets made, due to all the legacy software, is either going to directly support one of those interfaces, or have a compatibility mode which does.
    - Tsiklon 6y ago
      I do wonder why they've not chosen to make progress in that regard to advancing the state of the system. Surely these are known good ideas that would improve the customer experience and the system from a technical level. I only speak as a very casual windows user, there is nuance I will miss with Microsoft's attitudes to it. I would have thought that even a separation between OS and User applications could allow them to implement features like a VFS, while still maintaining compatibility. Are they not part of the way there with Hyper-V + WSL?
      - naikrovek 6y ago
        Microsoft would love to do these things, but backwards compatibility guarantees prevent advancement a lot of the time. You would not believe some of the business critical software out in the field. They rely on very obscure bugs being present in order to function, and they sometimes can't be fixed because the source code is missing. Apple has chosen the opposite path, which is to give the middle finger to long-term backwards compatibility, and advance their operating systems technically. You can't run an OSX game from 2002 on the Macs of today, but you almost always can run a Windows game from 2002 on the Windows 10 PCs of today.
    - userbinator 6y ago
      The Windows equivalent is IFS, and that has been around since MS-DOS: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Installable_File_System https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Installable_File_System
- naikrovek 6y ago
  > Windows won't let you delete a file that's still in use, so this scenario can't happen. Windows lets you delete files which are open all you want, and Windows also lets the application which opens the file prevent that. A lot of things like this are blamed on Windows when it's actually Windows providing options to the application developer, and the application developer choosing to take advantage of options like that when they don't need to. see: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/win32/api/fileapi/nf-fileapi-lockfileex https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/win32/api/fileapi/n... and note in the left side nav that reading, writing, and locking are all separate operations. (This is a common misconception that I wanted to clear up, and isn't super relevant to the topic at hand.)

I actually had to recover a deleted file on OSX once. I sure wished the proc filesystem was present there. I ended up using gdb (or maybe lldb I don't recall) to load a shared object that did a seek()/open()/copy(). Totally hacky but it worked!

btilly 6y ago

Actually /proc was invented on Solaris in the mid-90s. However this story took place on DEC Unix about 10 years earlier. So /proc was not available.

anthk 6y ago
False, from plan9.
- wizzwizz4 6y ago
  Like with Euler, we generally credit the first one to do it after Plan9.

userbinator 6y ago

...and Windows won't let you delete a file that's still in use, so this scenario can't happen.

Tsiklon 6y ago
That is also problematic - and if I recall correctly partly one of the reasons behind why windows requires restarts so frequently when software updates are on the table.
- mjevans 6y ago
  Yes, that is indeed the major pain. Unix-likes have an actual VFS as an API and it happens (at least on every unix-like I've worked on for any bit of time, which is mostly Linux but I expect BSD has it as well) to allow for comparatively wondrous workflows. Windows programs also often only support 'CDs' (ISO9660 / UDF), FAT, NTFS, and maybe SMB/CIFS (Samba / CIFS) network shares. Since Windows lacks (or at least historically lacked) a general VFS they could target. That's why any actual VFS that ever gets made, due to all the legacy software, is either going to directly support one of those interfaces, or have a compatibility mode which does.
  - Tsiklon 6y ago
    I do wonder why they've not chosen to make progress in that regard to advancing the state of the system. Surely these are known good ideas that would improve the customer experience and the system from a technical level. I only speak as a very casual windows user, there is nuance I will miss with Microsoft's attitudes to it. I would have thought that even a separation between OS and User applications could allow them to implement features like a VFS, while still maintaining compatibility. Are they not part of the way there with Hyper-V + WSL?
    - naikrovek 6y ago
      Microsoft would love to do these things, but backwards compatibility guarantees prevent advancement a lot of the time. You would not believe some of the business critical software out in the field. They rely on very obscure bugs being present in order to function, and they sometimes can't be fixed because the source code is missing. Apple has chosen the opposite path, which is to give the middle finger to long-term backwards compatibility, and advance their operating systems technically. You can't run an OSX game from 2002 on the Macs of today, but you almost always can run a Windows game from 2002 on the Windows 10 PCs of today.
  - userbinator 6y ago
    The Windows equivalent is IFS, and that has been around since MS-DOS: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Installable_File_System https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Installable_File_System
naikrovek 6y ago
> Windows won't let you delete a file that's still in use, so this scenario can't happen. Windows lets you delete files which are open all you want, and Windows also lets the application which opens the file prevent that. A lot of things like this are blamed on Windows when it's actually Windows providing options to the application developer, and the application developer choosing to take advantage of options like that when they don't need to. see: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/win32/api/fileapi/nf-fileapi-lockfileex https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/win32/api/fileapi/n... and note in the left side nav that reading, writing, and locking are all separate operations. (This is a common misconception that I wanted to clear up, and isn't super relevant to the topic at hand.)