Introduction

Extended attributes (xattr), while (sort of) supported under linux, are somewhat of a second class citizen. ProFUSE makes use of them to reveal custom ProDOS information (such as resource forks, file types, and creator types). For debugging and verification, we present the xattr utility

Compiling

Note: OS X has an xattr utility (with a different syntax). You can, of course, compile and use this one as well.

g++ xattr.cpp -o xattr

Usage

xattr list filename [attribute names ...]

xattr dump filename [attribute names ...]

xattr read filename attribute

xattr write filename attribute

If no attribute names are specified, all attributes will be listed or dumped, accordingly. read and write read or write data from stdin or stdout, respectively.

Examples


qnap:/usr/local/src/profuse# ./xattr list /mnt/Text/Dynobricks 
com.apple.FinderInfo           32
com.apple.TextEncoding         11
prodos.AuxType                  2
prodos.FileType                 1
prodos.ResourceFork           844
user.charset                    9
user.mime_type                 10


qnap:/usr/local/src/profuse# ./xattr dump /mnt/Text/Dynobricks 
com.apple.FinderInfo: 32
000000:	70 50 54 45 70 64 6f 73  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 	pPTEpdos........
000010:	00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 	................

com.apple.TextEncoding: 11
000000:	4d 41 43 49 4e 54 4f 53  48 3b 30                	MACINTOSH;0     

prodos.AuxType: 2
000000:	45 54                                            	ET              

prodos.FileType: 1
000000:	50                                               	P               

prodos.ResourceFork: 844
000000:	00 00 00 00 8c 00 00 00  3e 01 00 00 00 00 00 00 	........>.......
000010:	00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 	................
000020:	00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 	................
...
000340:	00 00 00 00 5c 00 00 00  0c 00 00 00             	....\.......    

user.charset: 9
000000:	6d 61 63 69 6e 74 6f 73  68                      	macintosh       

user.mime_type: 10
000000:	74 65 78 74 2f 70 6c 61  69 6e                   	text/plain

xattr is not ProDOS/ProFUSE specific, so you can use it on other file systems. Assuming you can find other files with extended attributes...