10th ed. chapter 13 https://www.cs.csustan.edu/~john/Classes/CS3750/Notes/Chap13/13_Fil...

(Latest Revision: Thu Jun 06 2019)

[2019/06/06: added some figures]
[2019/06/06: added captions]
[2019/05/07: completion of first full version for 10th edition]

Chapter Thirteen -- File-System Interface -- Lecture Notes

• Intro

The implementation of file systems is a major aspect of operating system architecture. Designers have
to decide how to map file system information onto the physical storage device(s), and what methods to
provide for access and manipulation. File systems are often performance bottlenecks, and it is quite a
challenge to make them adequately efficient.

File systems consist of two parts, a collection of files and a directory structure. The purpose of the
directory structure is to provide information about, and organization of the files.

• 13.0 Objectives

◦ Explain the function of file systems.

◦ Describe the interfaces to file systems.
◦ Discuss file-system design tradeoffs, including access methods, file-sharing, file locking, and
directory structures.
◦ Explore file-system protection.

• 13.1 File Concept

A clinking, clanking, clattering collection of caliginous junk

◦ A file is a logical unit of storage - the smallest allotment of logical secondary storage, a named
collection of related information that is recorded on secondary storage, "a clinking, clanking,
clattering collection of caliginous junk," as it were.

◦ 13.1.1 File Attributes

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Figure 13.1: A file info window on MacOS

Typical file attributes include

▪ Name (human readable)
▪ Identifier (unique id number)
▪ Type (info needed for OS support of file type)
▪ Location (a pointer to the file's location on a device)
▪ Size (number of, say, bytes, words, or blocks)
▪ Protection (indication of who or what has permission to read, write, execute, and so on)
▪ Timestamps and user identification (things like time and date of creation, last
modification, or last use)
▪ There are many other possibilities for attributes, such as the character-coding used for a
text file, or a file checksum.
▪ An operating system stores file attributes in the file-system directory structure.

◦ 13.1.2 File Operations

▪ Files are abstract data structures. They have associated file operations, which are
implemented with system calls:
▪ Creating a file (allocate space and make entry in a directory)
▪ Opening a file (cache info about the file in main memory and return a pointer to it)
▪ Writing a file (may involve updating a pointer to current file position)
▪ Reading a file (also may involve updating a pointer to current file position)
▪ Repositioning within a file (change the value of the file pointer)
▪ Deleting a file (remove entry from directory and deallocate space no longer used)

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▪ Truncating a file (release space and reset size to zero)

▪ The operations above are a minimal set. Designers can implement other operations using
combinations. For example to copy a file we can create a new file, then read from the old
and write to the new.

▪ Many systems require that files be opened before use. The open operation places directory
information about the file into an open file table data structure in primary memory. That
way, processes will be able to make a lot of accesses to the file without needing to fetch
directory information from the disk each time.

▪ In systems that allow multiple processes to have a file open simultaneously, it is customary
to have two levels of open file tables - a single system-wide table, and multiple per-process
open file tables. Each per-process table holds information having to do with the particular
process' use of the file, such as the current read and write positions of the process in the
file. The entry for a file in the per-process table contains a pointer to the entry for the file
in the system-wide table. Process-independent things like location of the file on disk,
access dates, file size, and file open count are contained in the file's entry in the system-
wide file table.

▪ Info associated with an open file:

▪ File pointer (last read/write location of the process)
▪ File-open count (number of processes that have the file open)
▪ Location of the file (to locate where to read/write)
▪ Access rights (the mode of file use granted to the process)

▪ File-locking operations may be available, shared and/or exclusive locks, mandatory and/or
advisory locks.

◦ 13.1.3 File Types

▪ There are various file types, such as text, binary, executable. Often filename extensions are
used to indicate the type of a file. Most file types are not fully supported by the operating
system.
▪ It is common for the OS to treat most files simply as an unstructured sequence of bytes.

◦ 13.1.4 File Structure

▪ Each OS must fully support at least one executable file type, so that the OS can load and
execute programs.

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Figure 13.3: Common file types

◦ 13.1.5 Internal File Structure

▪ All basic I/O functions are performed block by block - physical file blocks - normally the
512-byte data sections of disk sectors.
▪ Files are sequences of logical records that must be mapped to file blocks. Applications
may do the mapping, or the OS may do it.
▪ All files are allocated in whole numbers of physical blocks, and therefore all file systems
suffer from internal fragmentation.

• 13.2 Access Methods

◦ Information in files can be accessed in different ways.

◦ 13.2.1 Sequential Access

▪ Sequential access is the simplest and most common file access method.
▪ The file is read as a sequence from start to finish, as a tape would be read.
▪ Writing is similar. Each write operation appends a new item to the end of the file.
▪ "Read next" and "write next" are typical operations.
▪ The OS maintains a pointer to the current location in the file.
▪ The OS may support an operation to reposition the pointer (seek).

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Figure 13.4: Sequential-access file

◦ 13.2.2 Direct Access

▪ Direct access allows the user to access blocks in arbitrary order - to treat the file as if it
were an array of file blocks.
▪ Typical operations are of the form read block #n or write block #m.
▪ Block numbers are usually logical addresses that run from 0 contiguously to some upper
limit.
▪ Assume that the first byte in the file is numbered 0, that the file is a sequence of records of
size L bytes, that the records are numbered starting at 0, and that we want to request the
Nth record in the file. In that case we compute the starting byte number N*L and fetch the
L bytes of the file starting with byte N*L.

Figure 13.5: Simulation of sequential access on a direct-access file

◦ 13.2.3 Other Access Methods

▪ Other access methods can be built on direct access, often using an index to look up file
block numbers and then using direct access.

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Figure 13.6: Example of index and relative files

• 13.3 Directory Structure

◦ The directory is basically a table for looking up information about files, using the name of the
file as the lookup key.
◦ The directory structure needs to support the following operations.
▪ Search for a file (by name)
▪ Create a file (add to directory)
▪ Delete a file (remove from directory)
▪ List a directory (list names and info for files in directory)
▪ Rename a file (change directory entry)
▪ Traverse the file system (access all directories and files, for example when performing a
backup)

◦ 13.3.1 Single-Level Directory

▪ In this scheme the directory works like a single list of entries. Even if there are multiple
users, no two files are allowed to have the same name.

Figure 13.7: Single-level directory

◦ 13.3.2 Two-Level Directory

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Figure 13.8: Two-level directory

▪ In a two-level directory structure, there is a master file directory that has multiple sub-
directories.

▪ Each user on a computing system can be assigned his or her own 'home' directory. Users
can name files whatever they like without fear of collisions with the filenames of other
users.

▪ If a user name and file name within the user's directory are specified, this "pathname"
uniquely determines which file it is.

▪ The OS assumes that a filename without a user name refers to the user's own directory, or
to a special directory that contains the system files (e.g. programs that are user shell
commands)

▪ The sequence of directories searched when a file is named is called a search path.

◦ 13.3.3 Tree-Structured Directories

Figure 13.9: Tree-structured directory structure

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▪ The tree-structured directory is a generalization of the two-level directory structure that

allows users to create their own tree of subdirectories, and to use this structure to group
and organize their files.

▪ The tree has a root, and every file or directory has a unique pathname that starts with the
root.

▪ Processes can typically "move around" in the tree, by using a system call to specify which
directory is their current working directory.

▪ The accounting file (e.g. passwd file) of a user typically designates which directory should
initially be made the current working directory when the user logs in.

▪ Pathnames can be absolute or relative.

▪ How to delete directories is an interesting policy decision.

◦ 13.3.4 Acyclic-Graph Directories

Figure 13.10: Acyclic-graph directory structure

▪ This structure allows directories to share a file or subdirectory. By definition, this is not
possible in a tree.

▪ Shared files and subdirectories may be implemented through the use of (symbolic) links
[aka soft links]. A symbolic link may be thought of as a file that contains a path name. The
directory entry of the symbolic link has a special bit value set that marks the file as a link
rather than an ordinary file. For example, if /x/y is a file that we wish to share, we can put
a symbolic link in /z containing the pathname "/x/y" and name the symbolic link (file) r.
Then all references to /z/r will access the same file as /x/y.

▪ Going on with the previous example, the original directory entry for /x/y is sometimes
referred to as a hard link. It is just an ordinary directory entry, typically consisting of the
name of the file (y, in this case) and the address on disk of the directory information for the

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file.

▪ Another way to implement the sharing of the file would be to use another hard link - an
entry in the /z directory that contains the other name (r, in this case), plus the same address
on disk of the directory information for the original file (known as /x/y). This gives us two
separate directory entries that point to the same file on disk.

▪ When there are multiple hard and/or soft links to files and/or directories, designers of the
system must take care when implementing the file and directory deletion operations.
Pointers can be left dangling and/or file space can be deallocated when the files are still in
use.

◦ 13.3.5 General Graph Directory

▪ In a general graph directory structure, cycles of directories are allowed to exist.
▪ When such cycles are possible, it is more difficult to design algorithms that search and
traverse the file system correctly. It is also more difficult to find and deallocate some
directories that are no longer connected to the main part of the file system.

Figure 13.11: General graph directory

• 13.4 Protection

◦ When valuable information is stored on a computing system we want to keep it safe from
physical damage and improper access.

◦ 13.4.1 Types of Access

▪ We have to provide access to files, but we need controlled access.

▪ Here are examples of operations that must be controlled:

▪ Read (from file)
▪ Write (to file)
▪ Execute (load and execute file)

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▪ Append (add info to end of file)

▪ Delete (delete the file and free its space)
▪ List (list the name and attributes)
▪ Attribute change (change file attributes)

▪ There are different kinds of protection mechanisms, suited to different sorts of computing
systems. The next few sections discuss a few aspects of protection. There's more detail in
Chapter 20.

Figure 13.12: Windows 10 access-control list management

◦ 13.4.2 Access Control

▪ One approach to controlling access to files would be to keep an access control list (ACL)
with each file or directory. The ACL is a table data structure keyed on user id. Given the id
of any user, one can look up the specific access rights the user has on the file or directory
object. It's difficult to implement such full ACLs.

▪ Many systems are designed with a condensed form of ACLs in which access rights are
stored just for three entities: the owner of the file (or directory), the group, and everybody
else.
▪ Owner (the owner is the user who created the file)
▪ Group (a designated 'work group')
▪ Other (everyone else who uses the system)

▪ Some systems, like Solaris, use the (owner, group, others) approach by default, but also
allow more detailed access controls to be added to specific file objects. (The term file
object is meant to include files, directories, and other special kinds of items that might

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exist in the file system.)

▪ Read, write, and execute bits are commonly associated with each of the three classes:
owner (user), group, and other.

▪ For a plain file, a set read bit means a member of the class has permission to read the file.
Similarly the write bit gives permission to write, and the execute bit gives permission to
execute the file (presumably the file is a program, script, or the like).

▪ For directories, the read bit gives permission to list the directory. The write bit allows
creation of new files in the directory and, if it is empty, deletion of the directory. The
execute bit gives permission to cd to the directory, and to access the file objects in the
directory, subject to the permissions on the objects themselves.

▪ Users who lack either write or execute permission on a directory cannot delete a file object
in that directory.

◦ 13.4.3 Other Protection Approaches

▪ One approach is to assign a password to a file or directory.
▪ It can be complicated to manage multiple passwords on multiple objects.

• 13.5 Memory-Mapped Files

◦ File I/O sometimes requires multiple time-consuming system calls and disk accesses. Designers
can make things more efficient with virtual-memory techniques.

◦ 13.5.1 Basic Mechanism

▪ The system can handle the initial accesses to file blocks just like a page fault. After the OS
loads file blocks into frames of physical memory, the process can access them by using
routine memory-access operations.

▪ The OS can copy modified file blocks through to disk after the process closes the file, or
possibly as part of a periodic interrupt routine.

▪ When memory-mapping of files is available, it can be used to implement the sharing of a

file by a group of processes, shared memory, and copy-on-write functionality.

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Figure 13.13: Memory-mapped files

◦ 13.5.2 Shared Memory in the Windows API

Figure 13.14: Shared memory using memory-mapped I/O

• 13.6 Summary

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