Too many inodes

Ron Widell ron at motmpl.UUCP
Fri Nov 4 03:41:30 AEST 1988


Note- followup's directed to comp.bugs.sys5

In article <5167 at cbmvax.UUCP> ditto at cbmvax.UUCP (Michael "Ford" Ditto) writes:
>In article <580 at mbph.UUCP> hybl at mbph.UUCP (Albert Hybl  Dept of Biophysics  SM) writes:
>>there are a total of 6192 inodes assigned to the file system.
>>That is as it should be.  However, the du|wc count reports 6368
>>files/directories!
>
>"du -a" will count each link (directory entry) once, even if it refers
>to an inode that was already counted, thus for every file that has two
>links, your "du -a|wc -l" will be off by one (and off by two for each
>3-link file, etc.).
>
>In the news spool directory, multiple links are used when articles are
>crossposted.
>-- 
>					-=] Ford [=-
>
>"The number of Unix installations	(In Real Life:  Mike Ditto)
>has grown to 10, with more expected."	ford at kenobi.cts.com
>- The Unix Programmer's Manual,		...!sdcsvax!crash!elgar!ford
>  2nd Edition, June, 1972.		ditto at cbmvax.commodore.com

hmm, in looking at the description of du(1)  for both Vr2 and Vr3 I see:

"A file with two or more links is counted only once."

But then, looking at BUGS I see:
for Vr2- "If there are too many [not defined] distinct linked files,
du counts the excess files more than once."

and for Vr3- "If there are links between files in different directories where
the directories are on separate branches of the file system hierarchy, du will
count the excess files more than once."

So the problem *may* be due to the links, but maybe not.
It all depends ;-).

-- 
Ron Widell, Field Applications Eng.	|UUCP: motmpl!ron
Motorola Semiconductor Products, Inc.,	|Voice:(612)941-6800
9600 W. 76th St., Suite G		| If they *knew* what I was saying,
Eden Prairie, Mn. 55344 -3718		| do you think they'd let me say it?



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