Do we really need correct st_nlink count for directories?

[Corinna Vinschen <corinna-cygwin at cygwin dot com>]

Hi,

As my subject already asks, do we really need correct st_nlink count for
directories?  Windows doesn't maintain a link count for directories, so
Cygwin calls a function which evaluates st_nlink for directories by
scanning the directory and counting all its subdirs.  This is obviously
time consuming.  That's why we don't do it on remote drives at all.
Given that we don't do it on remote drives, all tools must be able to
deal with st_nlink == 1 for directories anyway.  Which, for instance,
all coreutils tools do.  So, shouldn't we drop this time consuming
subdir counting on local drives as well?  It doesn't seem to fullfil
any real need anymore, it's just a performance killer.


Corinna

-- 
Corinna Vinschen                  Please, send mails regarding Cygwin to
Cygwin Project Co-Leader          cygwin AT cygwin DOT com
Red Hat