[NTLUG:Discuss] True order of files in a directory.

[Robert Thompson]

> Ok..then why doesn't this exercise work to put the files in order.

I found this thread that explains a lot:
http://www.ussg.iu.edu/hypermail/linux/kernel/0106.3/1073.htm

Alan Cox weighs in and says that file creation time only appears to work
(for ext filesystems I assume). If you delete a file, then add a new
one, the order breaks. So the 'order' only works if all the files are
written sequentially.

(on ext2)
$ touch one two three four
$ ls -f
.  ..  one  two  three  four
$ rm three; touch five
$ ls -f
.  ..  one  two  five  four

Hans Reiser then pipes in and says ReiserFS does not work like ext and
that the raw order is arbitrary. I think it has more to do with storage
size on disk than creation time.