ctime vs. Create Time

["Joseph Galbraith" <galb-list%vandyke.com@localhost>]

Hi all,

In the 'draft-draft' version of the sftp draft, 
I added a ctime field.  Then, in the course of
some other work I was doing, I actually looked
at what the ctime field meant.

Here is the text describing both the ctime and
mtime fields from the linux man page:

       The  field st_mtime is changed by file modifications, e.g.
       by mknod(2), truncate(2), utime(2) and write(2)  (of  more
       than  zero  bytes).   Moreover, st_mtime of a directory is
       changed by the creation  or  deletion  of  files  in  that
       directory.   The st_mtime field is not changed for changes
       in owner, group, hard link count, or mode.

       The field st_ctime is changed by  writing  or  by  setting
       inode  information  (i.e., owner, group, link count, mode,
       etc.).

Now, thats not what I thought at all!  I thought the 'c' in
ctime stood for create.  (You may even notice that in the
paragraph describing 'atime', 'ctime', and 'mtime', I said
that ctime was 'creation' time.

Under windows, the creation time of a file is stored, and I
was looking for the ability to perserve that value.

So, in my working copy I've changed ctime into 'createtime'.

I'm not sure I see a need for both mtime and ctime. Do people
think we need both?

What do people think about create time?

- Joseph