HP-UX Reference (11i v2 07/12) - 7 Device (Special) Files, 9 General Information, Index (vol 10)
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glossary(9) glossary(9)
change their contents, etc. The owner can also change the files’ modes.
parent directory
The directory one level above a directory in the file hierarchy. All directories except the root directory
(
/) have one (and only one) parent directory. The root directory has no parent. See also dot and dot-
dot.
parent process
Whenever a new process is created by a currently-existing process (via fork(2)), the currently existing pro-
cess is said to be the parent process of the newly created process. Every process has exactly one parent
process (except the
init process, see init), but each process can create several new processes with the
fork(2) system call. The parent process ID of any process is the process ID of its creator.
parent process ID
A new process is created by a currently active process. The parent process ID of a process is the process
ID of its creator for the lifetime of the creator. After the creator’s lifetime has ended, the parent process
ID is the process ID of
init
.
password
A string of ASCII characters used to verify the identity of a user. Passwords can be associated with users
and groups. If a user has a password, it is automatically encrypted and entered in the second field of that
user’s line in the
/etc/passwd file. A user can create or change his or her own password by using the
passwd(1) command.
path name
A sequence of directory names separated by slashes, and ending with any file name. All file names except
the last in the sequence must be directories. If a path name begins with a slash (
/), it is an absolute
path name; otherwise, it is a relative path name. A path name defines the path to be followed through
the hierarchical file system in order to find a particular file.
More precisely, a path name is a null-terminated character string constructed as follows:
<path-name>::=<file-name><path-prefix><file-name>
/
<path-prefix>::=<rtprefix>/<rtprefix>
<rtprefix>::=<dirname>
/<rtprefix><dirname>/
where <file-name> is a string of one or more characters other than the ASCII slash and null, and <dir-
name> is a string of one or more characters (other than the ASCII slash and null) that names a directory.
File and directory names can consist of up to 14 characters on systems supporting short file names and up
to 255 characters on systems supporting long file names.
A slash (/) by itself names the root directory. Two or more slashes in succession (
////...) are treated
as a single slash.
Unless specifically stated otherwise, the null or zero-length path name is treated as though it named a
nonexistent file.
path name resolution
The process that resolves a path name to a particular file in a file hierarchy. Multiple path names can
resolve to the same file, depending on whether resolution is sought in absolute or relative terms (see
below). Each file name in the path name is located in the directory specified by its predecessor (for exam-
ple, in the path name fragment
a/b,fileb is located in directory a). Path name resolution fails if this
cannot be accomplished.
If the path name begins with a slash, the predecessor of the first file name in the path name is understood
to be the root directory of the process, and the path name is referred to as an absolute path name.If
the path name does not begin with a slash, the predecessor of the first file name of the path name is under-
stood to be the current working directory of the process, and the path name is referred to as a relative
path name. A path name consisting of a single slash resolves to the root directory of the process.
path prefix
A path name with an optional ending slash that refers to a directory.
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