Re: [RFC/PATCH 0/1] cygwin: Remove the Win32 l/stat() functions

Jeff King [off-list ref] writes:

quoted

But, taking a step back, I think it is a bad idea to have an unreliable
stat() masquerading as a real stat().  If we want to allow the use of an
unreliable stat for certain purposes, let's have two stat() interfaces:

* the true stat() (in this case I guess cygwin's slow-but-correct
implementation)

* some fast_but_maybe_unreliable_stat(), which would map to stat() on
most platforms but might map to the Windows stat() on cygwin when so
configured.

Yeah, that makes sense to me. I don't have a particular opinion on which
way to go, as I do not use cygwin at all (and on most platforms, the
two stat interfaces would just both call stat()).

I will leave it up to Cygwin folks whether they want to do something
like my patch as a band-aid while working up the two-stat() solution.

I think in the longer term two-stat solution is a good thing.  

0117c2f0 (Make core.sharedRepository work under cygwin 1.7,
2013-03-23) introduced get_st_mode_bits() to work around another
glitch in the fast-but-cheating-and-unreliable replacement, which
we may be able to revert once it is done.