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Inside Macintosh: Files /

Chapter 2 - File Manager / About the File Manager

File ID Reference Routines

The File Manager provides a set of three low-level functions for creating, resolving, and deleting file ID references. These functions were developed for use by the Alias Manager in tracking files that have been moved within a volume or renamed. In most cases, you should use the Alias Manager, not file IDs, to track files. See the chapter "Alias Manager" in this book.

You establish a file ID reference when you need to identify a file using a file number (see "File IDs" on page 2-24). You create a file ID reference with the PBCreateFileIDRef function. Because the File Manager assigns file numbers independently on each volume, file IDs are not unique across volumes.

You can resolve a file ID reference by calling the PBResolveFileIDRef function, which determines the name and parent directory ID of the file with a given ID. If you no longer need a file ID, remove its record from the directory by calling the PBDeleteFileIDRef function.

Note

Removing a file ID is seldom appropriate, but the function is provided for completeness.