Re: inconsistent ls result

["Mumia W.." <paduille.4061.mumia.w+nospam@earthlink.net>]

On 09/19/2007 05:47 AM, Mathieu DESPRIEE wrote:
> Hi,
>
> I have an inconsistent behavior in a ext3 file system.
>
> Here are the result of 2 ls commands done within a few minutes of time :
>
>   www1:/data/documents/upload/bill/invoices# ls -ld 00/00071/0007113* 

Directory listed: 0007113 (two 1's)


>   drwxr-sr-x  2 webadmin webadmin 4096 2007-09-07 20:40
> 00/00071/00071130
>   drwxr-sr-x  2 webadmin webadmin 4096 2007-09-07 20:40
> 00/00071/00071131
>   drwxr-sr-x  2 webadmin webadmin 4096 2007-08-10 23:31
> 00/00071/00071132
>   drwxr-sr-x  2 webadmin webadmin 4096 2007-08-10 23:31
> 00/00071/00071133
>   drwxr-sr-x  2 webadmin webadmin 4096 2007-09-07 20:40
> 00/00071/00071135
>   drwxr-sr-x  2 webadmin webadmin 4096 2007-09-07 20:40
> 00/00071/00071137
>
>
>   www1:/data/documents/upload/bill/invoices# ls -ld 00/00071/0007173* 

Directory listed: 0007173 (two 7's)

>   drwxr-sr-x 2 webadmin webadmin 4096 2007-08-10 23:31 00/00071/00071731
>
>   drwxr-sr-x 2 webadmin webadmin 4096 2007-09-07 20:42 00/00071/00071733
>
>   drwxr-sr-x 2 webadmin webadmin 4096 2007-09-10 16:36 00/00071/00071734
>
>   drwxr-sr-x 2 webadmin webadmin 4096 2007-09-07 20:42 00/00071/00071736
>
>   drwxr-sr-x 2 webadmin webadmin 4096 2007-04-05 00:33 00/00071/00071738
>
>   drwxr-sr-x 2 webadmin webadmin 4096 2007-08-10 23:31 00/00071/00071739
>
>
> In between, nothing but some navigation in the directory structure, with
> some cd or ls commands... For info, the 00071 directory contains around
> 700 sub-entries.
> It's sure that no other program running in the background move or change
> anything in this directory structure.
>
>
> Another manifestation of the same problem :
>
>
>   www1:/data/documents/upload/bill/invoices# cd 00/00071/00071134 
>   -bash: cd: 00/00071/00071134: No such file or directory 
>
>   www1:/data/documents/upload/bill/invoices# ls -ld 00/00071/00071734 
>   drwxr-sr-x 2 webadmin webadmin 4096 2007-09-10 16:36 00/00071/00071734
>
>
>   www1:/data/documents/upload/bill/invoices# ls -l 00/00071/00071734 
>   total 528 
>   -rw-r--r-- 1 webadmin webadmin 93401 2007-04-05 00:33 Bill.pdf 
>
> 	<--  cut : the listing works well. All files are correctly
> listed -->
>
>   www1:/data/documents/upload/bill/invoices# cd 00/00071/00071134 
>   -bash: cd: 00/00071/00071134: No such file or directory

Correct, the directory listing at the top does not show 00071134 as an 
entry.

> This occurs on a highly used production server, so we cannot easily
> reboot or unmount this filesystem for fsck... and a fortiori we cannot
> neither try to upgrade any lib.
>
> The kernel version is 2.6.8-2-686-smp #1 SMP Thu May 19 17:27:55 JST
> 2005.
> The impacted filesystem is ext3.
>
> I can't find any referenced bug that looks like this problem.
>
> Any clue ?
>
> MD.

Please forgive me if I'm missing something obvious. You listed two 
different directories and got two different results. I don't see the 
problem.

7 != 1