Virtual File System
To be distinguished from a file system implementation, a Virtual File System allows users to associate file names, e.g. /home/my_file.txt, with data on a device.
1. This is typically done as follows:
- A program makes a system call
open()to the kernel, to access the file/home/my_file.txt - The VFS, a part of the kernel, consults the mount table to see which device
/homelives on, e.g./dev/sda1 - A file system driver, specific to the concrete file system reads data from the device. (Remember, the concrete file system is on the disk. We say that the disk is formatted)
- The file system driver is hardware independent. The actual reading from the hardware is handled by a hardware specific driver