NAME

dir − format of directories

SYNOPSIS

#include <sys/types.h>
#include <sys/dir.h>

DESCRIPTION

A directory behaves exactly like an ordinary file, save that no user may write into a directory.  The fact that a file is a directory is indicated by a bit in the flag word of its i-node entry (see fs(4)). The structure of a directory entry as defined in <sys/dir.h> is:

#ifndefDIRSIZ
#defineDIRSIZ14
#endif

structdirect {
ino_td_ino;
chard_name[DIRSIZ];
};

By convention, the first two entries in each directory are for ‘.’ and ‘..’.  The first is an entry for the directory itself.  The second is for the parent directory. The meaning of ‘..’ is modified for the root directory of the master file system; there is no parent, so ‘..’ has the same meaning as ‘.’.

SEE ALSO

getdents(2), dirent(4), fs(4). 

NOTE

This page describes only the structure of an EFS or Bell filesystem directory entry; other filesystem types exist.  Therefore, programs should not read directories directly with read(2), but use the filesystem independent interface described in getdents(2) and directory(3C).

Version 3.6  —  December 20, 1987