GNU Info

(kpathsea.info)Database format

---

Prev: Filename aliases Up: Filename database

---

Enter node , (file) or (file)node

Database format
---------------

  The "database" read by Kpathsea is a line-oriented file of plain
text. The format is that generated by GNU (and most other) `ls'
programs given the `-R' option, as follows.

   * Blank lines are ignored.

   * If a line begins with `/' or `./' or `../' and ends with a colon,
     it's the name of a directory.  (`../' lines aren't useful,
     however, and should not be generated.)

   * All other lines define entries in the most recently seen directory.
     /'s in such lines will produce possibly-strange results.

   * Files with no preceding directory line are ignored.

  For example, here's the first few lines of `ls-R' (which totals about
30K bytes) on my system:

     bibtex
     dvips
     fonts
     ls-R
     metafont
     metapost
     tex
     web2c
     
     ./bibtex:
     bib
     bst
     doc
     
     ./bibtex/bib:
     asi.bib
     btxdoc.bib
     ...