on 6/26/06 1:46 AM, Jordan K. Hubbard wrote:
> I believe the creation date is not
> something you're intended to spoof - it's when the file was created.
> If you create a backup file, that backup file will have its own
> creation date. If you restore from backup in such a way that the
> original file is deleted and replaced (e.g. a new inode is allocated)
> then, by all rights, the new file is not the same as the old file and
> should have its (newer) creation date reflect this. FWIW, this
> behavior is not unique to MacOSX.
I can see how you would think this way from an implementer's point of view.
Certainly to duplicate or backup a file, the implementation must create a
new file to copy the old file's contents into.
However, from an end user's point of view, this is not intuitive at all. A
duplicate of a file should no more have its own creation date than a
photocopy of a letter should receive a new date. It would be nice if a
duplicate/backup copy incorporated *additional* metadata regarding the
duplication date history, but the creation date, as well as other metadata,
should be preserved.
I ought to be able to make a backup copy of a file or folder with the tool
of my choice, then replace (restore) the original with the backup and all
metadata should be restored. Perhaps it might add information that the two
copies happened, but at the least it ought to get me back to where I
started.
This is the behavior of traditional Mac OS and of the current Mac OS X
Finder. Other utilities ought to do the same.
-Marc
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