[Remind-Fans] tkremind kills symlinks

[David F. Skoll]

David A. De Graaf wrote:

>> Yep.  When you delete a reminder, tkremind creates a temporary file
>> called ~/.reminders.xxx and then renames it.
                                    ^^^^^^^
> Life would be so much sweeter if the verb were 'copies'.

Except that's unsafe.  UNIX supports an atomic "rename", but not
an atomic "copy".  Imagine two instances of TkRemind editing the file
at about the same time...

>> Bottom line: Don't use a symlink.  If you must use a symlink,
>> make ~/.reminders a *directory* rather than a file and keep your
>> actual reminders in ~/.reminders/100-tkremind.rem

> David, you have a twisted mind.  Oddly, this works perfectly.

Right, because TkRemind creates ~/.reminders/100-tkremind.rem.xxx and
renames it to ~/.reminders/100-tkremind.rem which does not molest the
~/.reminders symlink.

> Thank you (for what I hope will be a temporary kludge.).

It'll be permanent, I'm afraid... there are no plans to change
the way TkRemind edits the file.

Regards,

David.