From: Matthew Wilcox <willy@infradead.org>
To: Al Viro <viro@zeniv.linux.org.uk>
Cc: lampahome <pahome.chen@mirlab.org>, linux-fsdevel@vger.kernel.org
Subject: Re: why do we need utf8 normalization when compare name?
Date: Mon, 2 Mar 2020 09:14:31 -0800 [thread overview]
Message-ID: <20200302171431.GQ29971@bombadil.infradead.org> (raw)
In-Reply-To: <20200302152818.GN23230@ZenIV.linux.org.uk>
On Mon, Mar 02, 2020 at 03:28:18PM +0000, Al Viro wrote:
> Why the hell do we need case-insensitive filesystems in the first place?
> I have only heard two explanations:
> 1) because the layout (including name equivalences) is fixed by
> some OS that happens to be authoritative for that filesystem. In that
> case we need to match the rules of that OS, whatever they are. Unicode
> equivalence may be an interesting part of _their_ background reasons
> for setting those rules, but the only thing that really matters is what
> rules have they set.
> 2) early Android used to include a memory card with VFAT on
> it; the card is long gone, but crapplications came to rely upon having
> that shit. And rather than giving them a file on the normal filesystem
> with VFAT image on it and /dev/loop set up and mounted, somebody wants
> to use parts of the normal (ext4) filesystem for it. However, the
> same crapplications have come to rely upon the case-insensitive (sensu
> VFAT) behaviour there, so we must duplicate that vomit-inducing pile
> of hacks on ext4. Ideally - with that vomit-induc{ing,ed} pile
> reclassified as a generic feature; those look more respectable.
>
> (1) is reasonable enough, but belongs in specific weird filesystems.
> (2) is, IMO, a bad joke.
>
> Does anybody know of any other reasons?
I've heard it was primarily developed to help port an ecosystem known
for prioritising shipping-on-time over quality-of-code from Windows to
Linux. I'm not sure why a variant of #2 wasn't a solution they used.
I'm not a fan of having case-insensitive unicode tables in the kernel.
next prev parent reply other threads:[~2020-03-02 17:14 UTC|newest]
Thread overview: 10+ messages / expand[flat|nested] mbox.gz Atom feed top
2020-03-02 9:00 why do we need utf8 normalization when compare name? lampahome
2020-03-02 10:37 ` Aleksa Sarai
2020-03-02 10:47 ` Aleksa Sarai
2020-03-03 1:48 ` lampahome
[not found] ` <20200303070928.aawxoyeq77wnc3ts@yavin>
2020-03-03 10:13 ` lampahome
2020-03-03 17:22 ` Theodore Y. Ts'o
2020-03-02 12:54 ` Matthew Wilcox
2020-03-02 15:28 ` Al Viro
2020-03-02 17:14 ` Matthew Wilcox [this message]
2020-03-02 18:12 ` Theodore Y. Ts'o
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