> Because then applications have to keep all of the data payload in a
> particular byte order. Half of our architectures (or there abouts) would
> then all have to always byte swap.

Um, we already do this in the network drivers.  What's the big deal?
IMHO, it would be a good idea to specify a fixed byte order for the
whole large-i-node - the cost for this is really small, and the
benefit is huge.  Imagine: no more architecture-specific filesystems.

> The magic number is a 32-bit integer, so we have tons of space. :-)

Famous last words... :')

			       _MelloN_