The trick in the NetWare 3 model was to segregate the directory entries onto special reservedI resigned as Chief Scientist of Solera Networks May 8 this year -- mostly because I was not allowed to have any freedom, including working on
4K directory blocks (128 byte dir records). When it came time to purge storage after the file system filled, an entire 4K block and all
chains was deleted during block allocation for new files. The dir blocks were ordered by date -- oldest ones got purged
first. The model worked very well until compression was added to the filesystem, then it started getting complex.
I would be willing to help instrument the NetWare 3 model in this proposal on ext3, since this is a basic versioning model and
would provide coverage for 99% of the folks needing this capability. I am available for questions.
Jeff