Do I need sgi_fam?

[jkls]

I can't believe it's been three weeks but thank you for this detailed 
answer.
I have been setting up Gentoo on a P400. "emerge system" took up one whole
computing weekend.  I absolutely love the results.

Thanks again.
LS


Walter Dnes wrote:

>On Sun, Nov 23, 2003 at 12:53:54PM -0500, jkls wrote
>  
>
>>Ok, I've found where it may be started.
>>It's in inetd.conf. So I wonder why it
>>is always running and do I actually need it?
>>    
>>
>
>  FAM (File Access Monitor) is a program that monitors constantly
>monitors specific files for any changes.  Here's the theory...
>
>  If you're running one program that needs to update a screen when a
>file changes, the program can poll the file every few seconds.  But what
>if you're running a whole bunch of programs that need to track file
>changes ?  Rather than have several programs scanning your drive, the
>FAM daemon does all the monitoring and informs client programs when
>files have changed.  If there is any overlap, FAM will inform both
>clients, polling the file only once, saving a bunch of disk accesses.
>With multiple file-browsers on multiple desktops, this is supposed to
>be the most efficient method.
>
>  Now for the implementation.  FAM is *NOT* a "well-known service" with
>a reserved port in /etc/services.  So it has to register with sunrpc on
>port 111 (hello L1on and other linux worms of a few years ago) and is
>assigned an un-used port.  Client programs query sunrpc for the port
>number of FAM, and then talk to FAM on the assigned port.  I don't think
>that programs require FAM to run.  This is different from Redhat which
>set up KDE with dependancies to not install if FAM wasn't installed.
>
>  
>

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