Re: [Gnu-arch-users] extended attributes

[Tom Lord]

    > From: Andrew Suffield <address@hidden>

    > > That costs you atomicity, specifically atomic update.

    > (Yes, that really is the whole point. Think ACLs)

ACLs are something entirely different.   Unlike extended attributes in
general, they have a very specific semantics -- just like permission
bits in an inode.

It's a bit like (if not literally the case that) people implemented
ACLs and then looked at the code and said "Aw, what the heck, why not
surface this low-level detail to user space?   That way we can at
least shut up the fans of forks on MacOS filesystems."

-t