etcd/Documentation/etcd-file-system.md

#Etcd File System

## Structure
[TODO]
![alt text](./img/etcd_fs_structure.jpg "etcd file system structure")

## Node
In **etcd**, the **node** is the base from which the filesystem is constructed.
**etcd**'s file system is Unix-like with two kinds of nodes: file and directories.

- A **file node** has data associated with it.
- A **directory node** has child nodes associated with it.

All nodes, regardless of type, have the following attributes and operations:

### Attributes:
- **Expiration Time** [optional]

  The node will be deleted when it expires.

- **ACL**

  The path to the node's access control list.

### Operation:
- **Get** (path, recursive, sorted)

  Get the content of the node
    - If the node is a file, the data of the file will be returned.
    - If the node is a directory, the child nodes of the directory will be returned.
    - If recursive is true, it will recursively get the nodes of the directory.
    - If sorted is true, the result will be sorted based on the path.

- **Create** (path, value[optional], ttl [optional])

  Create a file. Create operation will help to create intermediate directories with no expiration time.
    - If the file already exists, create will fail.
    - If the value is given, set will create a file.
    - If the value is not given, set will crate a directory.
    - If ttl is given, the node will be deleted when it expires.

- **Update** (path, value[optional], ttl [optional])

  Update the content of the node.
    - If the value is given, the value of the key will be updated.
    - If ttl is given, the expiration time of the node will be updated.

- **Delete** (path, recursive)

  Delete the node of given path.
    - If the node is a directory:
    - If recursive is true, the operation will delete all nodes under the directory.
    - If recursive is false, error will be returned.

- **TestAndSet** (path, prevValue [prevIndex], value, ttl)

  Atomic *test and set* value to a file. If test succeeds, this operation will change the previous value of the file to the given value.
    - If the prevValue is given, it will test against previous value of
    the node.
    - If the prevValue is empty, it will test if the node is not existing.
    - If the prevValue is not empty, it will test if the prevValue is equal to the current value of the file.
    - If the prevIndex is given, it will test if the create/last modified index of the node is equal to prevIndex.

- **Renew** (path, ttl)

  Set the node's expiration time to (current time + ttl)

## ACL

### Theory
Etcd exports a Unix-like file system interface consisting of files and directories, collectively called nodes.
Each node has various meta-data, including three names of the access control lists used to control reading, writing and changing (change ACL names for the node).

We are storing the ACL names for nodes under a special *ACL* directory.
Each node has ACL name corresponding to one file within *ACL* dir.
Unless overridden, a node naturally inherits the ACL names of its parent directory on creation.

For each ACL name, it has three children: *R (Reading)*, *W (Writing)*, *C (Changing)*

Each permission is also a node. Under the node it contains the users who have this permission for the file referring to this ACL name.

### Example
[TODO]
### Diagram
[TODO]

### Interface

Testing permissions:

- (node *Node) get_perm()
- (node *Node) has_perm(perm string, user string)

Setting/Changing permissions:

- (node *Node) set_perm(perm string)
- (node *Node) change_ACLname(aclname string)


## User Group
[TODO]