Files, CORBA, and X (brief)

[Gregory Merchan <merchan phys lsu edu>]

I had a, perhaps crazy, idea last night about handling files.

Implement a CORBA thing (I don't know the language here) that is
responsible for user opened files. The first time a program tries
to open a file, this thing will intercede, lock the file, be
responsible for managing it until all instances are closed, and
present the data to the program. Thereafter any program requesting
the file will request it from the CORBA thing. This will provide
a way to have multiple synchronous views of files including
properties of the files. The user-space file manager would also
acknowledge the CORBA thing (maybe be the thing to some extent)
and update the icon, the label, or other properties should that
change from some other place.

This should be integrated with a selection manager (like
CLIPBOARD_MANAGER, but instead, say, FILE_MANAGER) to provide a
common point of access for a single user running partially over
a network. The CORBA thing would handle the actual file data
traffic and could be made to handle access by multiple users to
the same file.

That's all I have for now and I must learn a good deal more to
present a proper proposal; but perhaps someone else will beat me
to it.


Cheers,
Gregory Merchan