virtual filesystem ideas

[Ben Martin]

Hi,
  I find the discussion of making a standard out-of-proc vfs scheme very
interesting. I'm writing a VFS called libferris [1] and microkernel
stuff is earmarked for version 2.1 (the "spoon" release).

  Another issue if one is looking to support VFS' other than KDE/GNOME
is that of naming conventions. For example, in libferris if you want to
get inside a tar.bz2 you just read it like a directory, whereas IIRC in
gnome-vfs you have to chain #utar onto the URL. Issues like this dawned
on me when I was recently looking to allow libferris to mount gnome-vfs.

  A queryInterface() style sounds very nice to me so I can expose my EA
support, emblem partial order, indexes and EA schemas. Another example
where QI would be useful is supporting transactions which may or may not
be implementable in an efficient manner for a given URL.

  Unfortunately I lack the time right now to help out much with this
project coding wise and may be a little tardy in email replies :(
It sounds very interesting though and I'll be watching it and most
probably try to support it in the future.

[1] http://witme.sourceforge.net/libferris.web/