Chapter: File-System Interface

Chapter: File-System Interface

• File Concept
• Access Methods
• Directory Structure
• File-System Mounting
• File Sharing
• Protection
 File Management

• Process of storing, Controlling, Managing data stored on

secondary storage in the form of files.

• File Management:
– Ensure consistency of data when multiple users access the files
– Provides measures for file security and protection

• File system consists of 2 parts:

– Collection of files
– A Directory structure which organizes and provides all the
information about all the files in your system.
 File Concept
• File is a sequence of bits, bytes, lines, or records, the
meaning of which is defined by the file’s creator and user.
• Field
• Record
• File
• Data Base

A text file: is a sequence of characters organized into

lines and pages.
A source file is a sequence of functions, each of which is
further organized as declarations followed by executable
statements.
An executable file is a series of code sections that the
loader can bring into memory and execute.
 File Structure
1. Fixed Length Records
Records that has been assigned a fixed length.
Consider Record:
int 20 char int 10 char
Roll No. Name Age Qualification
1 Ram 20 B.Tech
2 Sham 19 B.Tech

All records are of same size

 File Structure
2. Variable Length Records
Instead of giving fixed size, records are separated
by connector.
1, ABC, 20, B.Tch
2, Sham, 19, B.Tech

Variable length records can be converted to fixed

length while implementing
 File Structure
1. None: Sequence or structure of words or
bytes
Files contains random records:
a) one line may contain 5 characters
b) other may contain 20 characters

2. Simple Record Structure

a) Lines
b) Fixed length records
c) Variable length records
 File Structure
3. Complex Structures

a) Formatted Document : defining start and ending

of paragraph

b) Re-locatable load file : There are some

instructions with addresses on the basis of which
location or relocation to the file is assigned.
File Attributes Data About Data-Meta Data
These attributes will be created automatically once the
file is created.
•Name – Name is usually a string of characters
•Identifier – unique tag (number) identifies file within file system
•Type – needed for systems that support different types
•Location – pointer to file location on device
•Size – current file size
•Protection – Access Permissions, controls who can do reading, writing,
executing
•Time, date, and user identification – data for protection, security, and
usage monitoring
•Information about files are kept in the directory structure, which is
maintained on the disk
 File Operations
All operations involve some system calls
1. Create: using a specific system call. Two steps are
necessary to create a file.
a) First, space in the file system must be found for the file.
b) Second, an entry for the new file must be made in the
directory.
• Read:
– Open a file
– File pointer points to particular record to be read
– Once a record/character is read, the file pointer is
increment
 File Operations
3. Write:
– Pointer is at the end of the file
– Can be repositioned and is incremented after every
write
– File pointer can be repositioned
 File Operations
• Reposition within file
• Delete
• Truncate

• Open(Fi) – search the file Fi from the directory

structure on disk

• Close (Fi) – Save / move the content of file Fi in

memory
 Open Files
• Several pieces of data are needed to manage open files:

– File Pointer: pointer to last read/write location

– File - Open Count: counter of number of times a file is

open

– Disk Location Of The File: From where the is

required to be opened, cache of data access
information

– Access Rights: per-process access mode information

File Types – Name, Extension
 Criteria for File Organization
1. Economy of Storage
There should be minimum redundancy in data
2. Simple
3. Maintenance
4. Reliability
What kind of reliability is provided for a file
Unreliable:- if index file is lost / corrupted, actual file may
be lost
Log File: Any record file is a log file
 Directory Structure
• Symbol table of files that stores all related information about a
file it holds with its contents

Directory

F1 F2 F3 F4
Fn
Files

Both the directory structure and the files reside on disk

Backups of these two structures are kept on tapes
 Operations Performed on Directory
Directory: collection of files or directories
• Directory is basically the Symbol Table that translates file
names into their directory entry. Example the phone directory
where we are having contact details of each person, Similarly
we are having file directory which carries the details of files
present in the directory.
Operations:
• Search for a file
• Create a file
• Delete a file
• List a directory
• Rename a file
• Traverse the file system : Search all directories/ sub directories
and files
 Directory Schemes
1. Single Level Directory
One directory many files
Entries

Single-Level Directory

Easy to support and understand.

Disadvantage:
Limitation:
When number of files increases or when the system has more than one user,
1. Difficult to remember the name of files when files increases
then Naming problem occurs. All files should have unique names.
2. Single directory for all users
3. File names created by different users should be different.
 Two Level
• 2. Two level directory, each user has his own user file
directory(UFD). If 10 user than 10 direcories

• UFDs have the similar structure, but each lists files of a single user.
 Tree Structure
• Users can create their sub directories to manage the files.
• Tree has Root directory and files have unique file names

users
 Paths
• Absolute Path: Begins at the root and follows a path down to the
specified file giving directory names on the path.
• Relative Path: Defines a path from the current directory.
• Creating a new file is done in current directory
• Delete a file
rm <file-name>
• Creating a new subdirectory is done in current directory
mkdir <dir-name>
Delete Directory:

Empty: rmdir <dir. Name>

Not Empty: rm –r <dir. name?>
 Acyclic-Graph Directories

• Multiple users can Have shared subdirectories and files

• Users have their own working directory and may have
one shared directory
• Shared subdirectory created by one user in one directory is
automatically visible to all users sharing that directory.
• Shared directory or file may exist at multiple places
simultaneously
• Because of sharing, a file may have multiple absolute
paths
• So different names can refer to same file
Acyclic-Graph Directories
 General Graph Directories
• Created by adding links to the existing directory
• Allows cycles in the same directory

• As all files are dependent / linked deleting a main file may

harm other files

• In case of deletion: Garbage Collection is used

• In First Pass: Traversing the entire file and marking
everything that can be accessed

• In Second Pass: Collect everything that is not marked as

the free space
 General Graph Directories
• There can be cycle in the directory arrangement

General Graph Directory

 Directory Implementation
• Directories need to be fast to search, insert, and delete,
with a minimum of wasted disk space.
1 Linear List
• A linear list is the simplest and easiest directory structure
• Finding a file requires a linear search.
• Deletions can be done by moving all or one entry to
vacant position and deleting the pointer.

2 Hash Table
• A hash table can also be used to speed up searches.
• Implementation is by using Hash value.
• (Division/Variant Method)
Chapter 11: Implementing File-System
 File System Structure
• File System resides on Secondary Storage

• Disk provides bulk storage on which a file system resides

• To improve I/O efficiency, I/O transfers between

memory and disk are performed in units of blocks.

• File system has 2 design problems:

– a) Defining How the file system should look to user
– b) Create a algorithm and data structure to map the
logical file system to physical file system.
Logical File System contains info. Meta Data, and manages file
structure
File Control Block
 File System Implementation
• On disk, file System may contain information about how to
boot an OS.
– a) Boot Control Block: Contains info. Needed by the
system to boot an OS. This block is empty if there is no
OS.
– b) Volume Control Block: Contain partition details:
• No. of blocks in partition
• Size of blocks
• Block pointers etc.
– c) Directory Structure: Used to organize files
– d) File Control Block: Contains info. About file:
• File Permissions
• Modification dates
• File owner, File size and Pointers
 File System Implementation
To Create a new File:

• Application program calls  Logical File System

• Logical File System allocates  New FCB

• System reads appropriate directory from memory

• Directory is updated with  New file and FCB

• New file and FCB is written back to  Disk

In-memory file-system structures. (a) File open. (b) File read.
 File System
• It is a part of OS, responsible for controlling secondary
storage space.

• File system consists of following:

– Access Methods: Manner in which data stored in files
is accessed
– File Management: Provide mechanism for files to be
stored, shared and secured.
– Storage Management: Allocating space for files on
secondary storage devices.
– File Integrity Mechanism: Guaranteeing that file
information is not corrupted
 Access Methods
• 1. Sequential Access:
• Information of the file is processed in order, one record after the other.

read next: reads a portion of the file (read record) and automatically
updates pointer. (move pointer to next location)
write next: Append to end of the file (write and update the pointer.
rewind or reset: to reset the file from beginning
 Access Methods
2. Direct Access: Or Relative access
• A file is made up of fixed length logical records that allow
programs to read and write records rapidly in no particular
order.
• For Direct Access, File is a numbered sequence of blocks or
records.

read n
write n
position to n (jump to record n)
read next
write next
n = relative block number
• First Relative Block of file is 0, Second is 1 and so on.
Absolute address could be anything.
 Indexed Access
• Index is created for file.
• Index contain pointers for various
blocks of a file.
• To find the record in the file, search
the index and then use the pointer
to access the file directly and to find
the desired record.
• An indexed file is a computer
file with an index that allows
easy random access to
any record given its file key.
• The key must be such that it
uniquely identifies a record.
• A relative file is a file in which each
record is identified by its ordinal
position in the file
 Allocation Methods
• Files are stored on disk

• Main Issue is: how to allocate space to these files so that

disk space is utilized effectively and file can be accessed
quickly.

• There are three major methods of storing files on disks:

– Contiguous
– Linked
– Indexed
 Allocation Methods
1. Contiguous Allocation

• Keep blocks of a file together in the continuous memory

locations.
• Performance is very fast, because reading successive blocks of
the same file generally requires no movement of the disk
heads.

• Storage allocation involves issues:

– first fit, best fit , worst fit etc

• Contiguous allocation of a file is defined by the disk address

and length of first block.
 Contiguous Allocation
• If file is n blocks long and starts at location b, the it
occupies:
b , b+1, b+2, ……. , b+n-1 locations

Directory entry for each file = Address of the starting block and
length of area allocated.

Best suited:
a) For Sequential Access: File system remembers disk address
of the last block referenced and reads next block when
required.
b) For Direct Access: Direct Access to block i of a file that starts
at block b, block b+i can be accessed immediately.
 Contiguous Allocation
• Problems can arise:
– Finding space for a new file
– When files grow
– if the exact size of a file is
unknown at creation time
– Suffers from problem of
external fragmentation.
– Difficult to know how much
space is needed for a file
– Alot of space becomes
unusable before the file fills
the space
 Linked Allocation
• Each file is a linked list of disk blocks
• Disk blocks can be scattered any where in disk
• Directory contains a pointer to first and last block of the
file.
• Exp: if file of 5 blocks might start at block 9, continue at
block 16, then block 1, block 10 and finally block 25.
• Each block contains a pointer to next block.
• If each block is 512 bytes and disk address requires 4
bytes then user see block of 508 bytes
• To create a new file , create a new entry in directory
• Each directory has a entry has a pointer to first disk
block of file.
• Pointer is initialized to NIL and size / data part is set to 0
 Linked Allocation
• Disk files can be stored as linked lists
• Linked allocation does not require pre-known file
sizes, and allows files to grow dynamically at any time.

Drawback
• It is efficient for sequential access files
• To find ith block of a file, we must start at the beginning
of that file and follow the pointers until we go to ith block.
• Requires extra space for pointers

• Problem with linked allocation is reliability:

– If a pointer is lost or damaged
 File Allocation Table
• Used by DOS
• It is a variation of linked
allocation
• All the links are stored in
a separate table at the
beginning of the disk.
• The benefit of this
approach is that the FAT
table can be cached in
memory, and improving
random access speeds.
 Indexed Allocation
• Indexed Allocation combines all of the indexes for
accessing file in a file.
• Create a table of indexes
• Index file contains pointers to blocks.
• Bring all the pointers together into one location : Index
Block
• Each ith entry in index block points to ith block of the file
• Create index of linked locations
• Indexed allocation support Direct Access.
– Any free space on the disk can be used for allocation
– Removes external fragmentation
 Indexed Allocation
• Advantages:
– Any free space on the disk can be used for allocation
– Removes external fragmentation
• Disadvantages:
– If index block is small, it will not be able to hold enough
pointers
– Entire index will have to be kept in main memory to
make it work
Indexed Allocation
Approaches to implement Index Block
• Linked Scheme - An index block is one disk block, which can
be read and written in a single disk operation.
• For large files several indexes can be combined and
maintained
• The first index block contains:
– Header information
– First N block addresses
– Pointer to linked index blocks.

• Multi-Level Index -

index block contains  pointers to secondary index blocks

 which further contain pointers to the actual data blocks.
Approaches to implement Index Block
• Combined Scheme -
• pointers provide access to more data blocks
• The advantage of this scheme:
– for small files the data blocks are readily accessible
 Free Space Management
• Process of looking after and managing unused blocks of
disk
• Os maintains free space list: which records all blocks that
are not allocated to any file

Methods to implement free space list:

• Bit Map or Bit Vector
• Linked List
• Grouping
• Counting
 Methods to implement free space list
Bit Map or Bit Vector
• Each block is represented by a bit
• If block is free, bit is set to 1 otherwise 0
 Linked List
• Linked list of all the free blocks is maintained
• First free block in the list can be pointed by the head
pointer

• Disadvantage: Traversing is time consuming

 Grouping
Grouping
• Maintained using linked list
• Reserve few disk blocks for management
• Modify linked list to:
– store address of next free blocks
– A pointer to next block that contains free block pointers
• In this address of n free blocks is stored in the first free blocks

Counting:
This method keeps the address of first free block and number of free
contiguous blocks that follow the free block,
(X100 + 10 free blocks)
 Mounting
Mount: Mounting makes file systems, files, directories, devices
and special files available for use and available to the user.

Process that instructs the OS that a file system is:

– ready to use
– associates it with a particular point in the overall file system
hierarchy
– sets options relating to its access
Example- In C Drive we are having turboc and if we want to
use the turbo c in D drive then we need to detach it from d
drive and attach it in c drive For implementing this we use
the concept of mounting. So OS is amking available turbo c
file system to d drive file system.
 File Sharing
Sharing of files is required for multi – user system
Sharing may be done through protection scheme

Multiple users:

1. User ID’s: identify users , assign permissions to the user

2. Group ID’s: allow users to be in groups , and assign
group access rights
 File Protection
Protect information against unauthorization

1. Access Control
Permissions:
Read
Write
Execute
Chmod 777 filename

2. Password Protection
 File System Mounting
• A file system must be mounted before it can be accessed
• A unmounted file system (i.e. Fig. 11-11(b)) is mounted at a mount
point
(a) Existing. (b) Unmounted Partition
Mount Point
 File Sharing
• Sharing of files on multi-user systems is desirable

• Sharing may be done through a protection scheme

• On distributed systems, files may be shared across a network

• Network File System (NFS) is a common distributed file-sharing method

• User IDs identify users, allowing permissions and protections to be
per-user

• Group IDs allow users to be in groups, permitting group access

rights

File Sharing – Multiple Users

 File Sharing – Remote File Systems
• Uses networking to allow file system access between systems
– Manually via programs like FTP
– Automatically, seamlessly using distributed file systems
– Semi automatically via the world wide web
• Client-server model allows clients to mount remote file systems from
servers
– Server can serve multiple clients
– Client and user-on-client identification is insecure or complicated
– NFS is standard UNIX client-server file sharing protocol
– CIFS is standard Windows protocol
– Standard operating system file calls are translated into remote
calls
• Distributed Information Systems (distributed naming services) such as
LDAP, DNS, NIS, Active Directory implement unified access to
information needed for remote computing
• File owner/creator should be able to control:
– what can be done
– by whom

• Types of access
– Read
Protection
– Write
– Execute
– Append
– Delete
– List
 Access Lists and Groups
• Mode of access: read, write, execute
• Three classes of users
RWX
a) owner access 7  111
RWX
b) group access 6  110
RWX
c) public access 1  001
• Ask manager to create a group (unique name), say G, and add some users to
the group.
• For a particular file (say game) or subdirectory, define an appropriate access.

owner group public

chmod 761 game

Attach a group to a file

chgrp G game
A Sample UNIX Directory Listing