Re:Your File System Is Already A Graph Database
by Retr0id on Wednesday April 08, 2026 @10:26AM
(#47690720)
GP was talking about symlink cycles though, which can't produce orphans during deletion.
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Re:Your File System Is Already A Graph Database
by rleigh on Wednesday April 08, 2026 @10:50AM
(#47691037)
True, I missed that. I suppose with symlinks you have the reverse problem: you can point to deleted filenames and then have broken links. The cycle detection is still an issue though--it has indeterminate complexity and the graph can be modified as you are traversing it!
Re:Your File System Is Already A Graph Database
by Retr0id on Wednesday April 08, 2026 @11:29AM
(#47691574)
This is true, but just about everyone has a symlink cycle on their system at `/proc/self/root`, and for the most part nobody notices. Having a max recursion depth is usually more useful than actively trying to detect cycles.