Mastering Linux Kernel Development

Extended file attributes

General file attributes tracked by a filesystem implementation are maintained in an inode and interpreted by appropriate operations. Extended file attributes are a feature that enables users to define custom metadata for a file, which is not interpreted by the filesystem. Such attributes are often used to store various types of information which depend on the type of data the file contains. For instance, document files can define the author name and contact details, web files can specify URL of the file and other security-related attributes such as digital certificates and crypto hash keys. Similar to normal attributes, each extended attribute is identified by a name and a value. Ideally, most filesystems do not impose ...