kdosd - KDOS Daemon

The kdosd daemon, inspired by Dave Kim's Middleman Server, provides across-card access to the KDOS file system via MEDS mailboxes.

kdosd is structured as follows:

    Create a COMMAND mailbox.
    DO FOREVER
        Read a command message from the COMMAND mailbox.
        Decode the message and process the command.
        Format a response message.
        Attach to the client's RESPONSE mailbox.
        Write the response message to the RESPONSE mailbox.
    ENDDO

Command messages are ASCII strings with the following format:

    "tag responseMailbox operation [argument(s)]"

where

tag

is an arbitrary, client-specified void * pointer.

responseMailbox

is the name of a MEDS mailbox to which kdosd will write a response message.

operation

is a KDOS operation.

argument(s)

are optional, operation-specific arguments.

After processing the command, kdosd formats a response message containing the client's command tag and the completion status:

    "tag status value [optionalText]"

where

tag

is the command tag supplied by the client.

status

is the errno status of processing the command.

value

is the result of the operation; e.g., the file descriptor for an OPEN operation, the number of bytes read for a READ operation, etc.

Supported Commands

CLOSE - closes an open file.

Command:	"tag responseMailbox CLOSE fd"
Response:	"tag errno status"

DELETE - deletes zero or more files whose names are matched by fileSpec.

Command:	"tag responseMailbox DELETE fileSpec"
Response:	"tag errno status"

LIST - returns the name of the index-th file.

Command:	"tag responseMailbox LIST index buffer maxBytes offset whence"
Response:	"tag errno status"

OPEN - opens a file and returns a file descriptor for the file.

Command:	"tag responseMailbox OPEN fileName flags"
Response:	"tag errno fd"

READ - reads data from a file.

Command:	"tag responseMailbox READ fd buffer maxBytes offset whence"
Response:	"tag errno numBytesRead"

RENAME - renames a file.

Command:	"tag responseMailbox RENAME oldName newName"
Response:	"tag errno status"

STAT - returns information about a file.

Command:	"tag responseMailbox STAT fileName buffer"
Response:	"tag errno status"

WRITE - writes data to a file.

Command:	"tag responseMailbox WRITE fd buffer numBytes offset whence"
Response:	"tag errno numBytesWritten"

The tag and buffer arguments are decoded using the "%p" format. The buffer argument should be a VME address accessible by kdosd.

Invocation:

% kdosd [-debug] [-vperror]

where

-debug

enables debug output (written to stdout).

-vperror

turns vperror() message output on. vperror() messages are low-level error messages generated by libgpl functions; normally, they are disabled. If enabled, the messages are output to stderr.