inotify for recursive directory monitoring

venkat_k · 12-23-2008, 03:56 AM

Is there any way to use the inotify api for monitoring the directories recursively? (i.e adding a directory for watch should monitor inner directories also) or the only option is to add recursive watches, which is painful.

Is there any better api than inotify for doing this?

Hko · 12-23-2008, 09:49 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by venkat_k

Is there any way to use the inotify api for monitoring the directories recursively?

The manual has a pretty precise answer to your question:

Quote:

Inotify monitoring of directories is not recursive: to monitor subdirectories under a directory, additional watches must be created.

venkat_k · 12-23-2008, 10:46 PM

Thanks for the reply.
Is there any API, better than inotify for this purpose?

Hko · 12-24-2008, 03:22 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by venkat_k

Thanks for the reply.
Is there any API, better than inotify for this purpose?

Probably not. inotify is already an improvement over the previous dnotify.

Guttorm · 12-24-2008, 03:45 AM

Hi

You say it's pain, but I guess the question is who gets the pain. You don't have to use many inotify watches, you can just add the subdirectories using inotify_add_watch, as well as adding/removing subdirectories when they are created/deleted.

If the kernel was to handle all the subdirectories, I guess it would get the pain. It's probably better that the userspace program gets the pain.

You can use some of the utility programs if you don't want to write the handeling of subdirectories, something like:

Code:

FILE *fp = popen("inotifywait -m -r -q /", "r");