File structure is tree.
Non leaf nodes are directories. A directory contains information on all those files contained in that directory.
A directory entry contains the filename in the folder and inode number.
The inode number references an inode - a file descriptor.
An inode contains:
An inode file is just like an entry in a lookup table.
Some systems (windows) use file extensions to indicate applications.
Unix can try to execute any file you want.
Exec will ook for “magic number” at head of valid executable binary file.
If number is not present, exec looks for “#!” - “hashbang” followed by name of program to execute file.
Otherwise assumes file is shell script and creates instance of user#s prefered shell to process it.
Filestore divided into fixed-size blocks.
Blocks not currently allocated to files are maintained in a free list. The free list is just a list of all those blocks not currently being used.
Several strategies for allocationg blocks:
Can be a simpel bit vector
11001111000
where 1 = in use and 0 = free
Simple and efficient if kept in memory:
Location information consists simply of start block then the number of blocks we have allocated to that file.
Advantagees: fast both for sequenetial and direct access
Problems
Using link lists
advantages
Can improve things by allocating blocks in clusters. But this worsens internal fragmentation as you may get some unused space in the cluster.
question:
i said before that going back to the free list that the free list ca be a simple bit vector telling which are in used and which arent
suppose we have a portion of the file store expressed in hexadecimal as: 735A In that portion of the file store, how many stores are free if that is our free list information?
We convert this to binary so 7 is 0111 3 is 0011 5 is 0101 A is 1010
So 7 free blocks.