Re: tiny patch to ange-ftp

[Katsumi Yamaoka <yamaoka@jpl.org>]

>>>>> In <87ll1chs0h.fsf-monnier+emacs@gnu.org>
>>>>>	Stefan Monnier <monnier@iro.umontreal.ca> wrote:

> I've just installed a patch which should fix it.  Does it work for you?

Thanks!  It works fine, but I prefer the second patch...

> Although the patch works (it fixes the symlink-following code), in reality,
> I see no reason why we should follow symlinks at all.  The normal code for
> insert-directory doesn't follow symlinks, so why should the ange-ftp
> version of it do it?  It seems to be asking for trouble, especially in the
> present case: what if dired wants to refresh a single line that contains
> a symlink?

> The change to follow symlinks has sadly no explanation:

>    revision 1.20
>    date: 2001/12/29 02:50:34;  author: rms;  state: Exp;  lines: +12 -6
>    (ange-ftp-insert-directory): Explicitly follow symlinks.

> In the ChangeLog file, we get a tiny bit more info:

> 	* net/ange-ftp.el (ange-ftp-allow-child-lookup): Always return nil.
> 	This fixes a bug that treated all files as directories.
> 	(ange-ftp-insert-directory): Explicitly follow symlinks.

> But it's still not clear why we'd want to follow symlinks.  My suspicion is
> that at that time, it was necessary to follow symlinks in order for the
> ange-ftp-ls command to give us a listing of a directory rather than just the
> single-line listing of a symlink.  In that case, this is not a problem any
> more since ange-ftp-ls now does "cd foo; ls" rather than "ls foo".  So I'd
> be happy to install the second patch.

I tried the second patch.  I think it is much better, and I can
agree that to follow symlinks there is meaningless.

> To see one of the problems with the idea of following symlinks, try
> something like

>   (insert-directory "/ftp@ftp.gnu.org:/pub" "-lFd")

> Of course, there's also the problem where the symlink points to itself.
> And also the problem that

>   (insert-directory "/ftp@ftp.gnu.org:/pub/gnu/winboard" "-lFd")

> will not list

>   lrwxrwxrwx    1 0        0              15 Nov 21  2003 winboard -> xboard/winboard

> but

>   drwxrwxr-x    2 0        1003         4096 Nov 29  2003 winboard/

> Contrary to what it would have done if we were working locally.

>         Stefan

I think concealing of file's identity is needless and unhelpful.

> --- ange-ftp.el	02 oct 2005 11:37:24 -0400	1.74
> +++ ange-ftp.el	02 oct 2005 11:38:44 -0400	
> @@ -4481,14 +4481,6 @@
>  (defun ange-ftp-insert-directory (file switches &optional wildcard full)
>    (if (not (ange-ftp-ftp-name (expand-file-name file)))
>        (ange-ftp-real-insert-directory file switches wildcard full)
> -    ;; Follow symlinks.
> -    (let (tem)
> -      (while (and (not wildcard)
> -                  (stringp (setq tem (file-symlink-p
> -                                      (directory-file-name file)))))
> -        (setq file
> -              (ange-ftp-expand-symlink
> -               tem (file-name-directory (directory-file-name file))))))
>      (insert
>       (cond
>        (wildcard