Symbolic-link identifying

A computer program product for executing a network file server on a computer, said computer program product including a plurality of computer executable instructions stored on a non-transitory computer-readable medium, wherein said instructions are executed by the computer to:

• determine a complete client path from an initial client path;
• combine the complete client path with a server export path to generate an absolute path having no symbolic links;
• and
• traverse the determined absolute path using a file descriptor of each file in the absolute path to identify a first symbolic link that was inserted in the absolute path after the absolute path was determined, including starting at a root file or directory of the absolute path and sequentially attempting to open each file or directory in the absolute path,
• wherein opening each file is performed using an open operation with a first parameter that causes the open operation to open a file or directory that is adjacent a most recently returned file descriptor in the absolute path, and a second parameter that causes the open operation to determine whether the adjacent file or directory is a symbolic link,
• wherein the open operation is a specialized open operation that starts from a directory identified by the first parameter as opposed to a general-purpose open operation that starts from a current working directory.

A network file system, comprising:

• a processor;
• a memory;
• and
• a network file server program including a plurality of instructions stored in the memory that are executed by the processor to:
• receive a file access request from a client of the network file system;
• concatenate a complete client path determined from the file access
• request with a server export path to determine an absolute path having no symbolic links;
• traverse the determined absolute path using a file descriptor of each file in the absolute path to identify a first symbolic link that was inserted in the absolute path after the absolute path was determined;
• obtain a file descriptor for the server export path;
• starting at the file descriptor for the server export path, sequentially attempt to open each file or directory in the absolute path;
• and
• open each file using an open operation with a first parameter that causes the open operation to open a file or directory that is adjacent a most recently returned file descriptor in the absolute path, and a second parameter that causes the open operation to determine whether the adjacent file or directory is a symbolic link,
• wherein the open operation is a specialized open operation that starts from a directory identified by the first parameter as opposed to a general-purpose open operation that starts from a current working directory.