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avfs virtual files

Posted: 04 Oct 2012, 16:22
by bigbass
compiled for 32 bit on porteus 1.2
http://bigbass-porteus.googlecode.com/f ... 7_PORT.tgz

This is a CLI development tool

It is a backend tool which will be used for an upcoming project

The basic use is to be able to look inside compressed files directly without decompressing them first
so you can run all types of commands on compressed files :)

AVFS is a system, which enables all programs to look inside gzip, tar, zip, etc. files or view remote (ftp, http, dav, etc.) files, without recompiling the programs.
mountavfs loads the avfsd daemon and mounts the virtual
filesystem at ~/.avfs.

Once done, the user will be able to access all kinds of com-
pressed files via the pseudo-fs ~/.avfs.

Testing the installation:
-------------------------

1) type mountavfs
a message should appear that avfs is loaded.

The README docs indicate that testing can be done as
ls /#avfsstat. This will not work. Using this version of
AVFS, try:

ls ~/.avfs/#avfsstat

Anytime the docs say /#avfsstat or filename#, always prepend
~/.avfs/, ex:

ls ~/.avfs/myzipfile.zip#
- or -
cat ~/.avfs/README.gz#



Stopping AVFS:
--------------
Make sure no files are being accessed via AVFS. Then:

umountavfs

or

fusermount -u ~/.avfs

This will unmount the virtual filesystem AND unload the
avfsd daemon. The user can start AVFS anytime later.

Re: avfs virtual files

Posted: 08 Oct 2012, 19:27
by brokenman
This looks interesting. How do you see what is inside a box without opening it?

Re: avfs virtual files

Posted: 10 Oct 2012, 16:20
by bigbass
brokenman wrote:This looks interesting. How do you see what is inside a box without opening it?
This is a very good question and I had to think about it awhile before answering
have someone else open the box for you :)

poking in the sources all the mount points and buffers are created automatically
and the backend tools such as zlib for example is called (imported) doing this work under the hood so the box does get opened first just done in a magical way

now the fun part will be using this for some project
to take advantage of this built in function
or view remote (ftp, http, dav, etc.) files,
this is the interesting part

I stumbled on this trying to mount many different formats
and hope to use it to read some files without having to decompress them manually first

Joe

Re: avfs virtual files

Posted: 10 Oct 2012, 22:34
by brokenman
I also find it interesting and it no doubt has many possibilities. I liked httpfs but saw no benefit in using it for remote activation of large modules. I found it quicker to just download the damn thing and activate it ... but of course this requires root.

This looks interesting. How do you see what is inside a box without opening it?
Hire a psychic remote viewer or apparently a coder. I guess the latter punches a hole in the box to get the index file and then if you request something in the box it is extracted.