Analysis of inotify events for different editors

This page collects information about the fired inotify events that different Linux editors fires on file modification. The events are collected using inotifywait.

Steps to add an event analysis of your editor:

1. Open the file
2. Launch inotifywait -m . in the directory containing the file
3. Change the file content
4. Save the file
5. Quit inotifywait

IMPORTANT NOTE: Remember to watch the directory containing the file, not the file itself!

Results

RubyMine (v3.2.4 && v4.0EAP, Lucid 64)

Manual and auto-save events are currently indistinguishable To disable RubyMine's auto-save/synchronization feature: File > Settings > General

total  attrib  delete_self  filename
3      1       1            coffee/script.coffee

Sublime Text

total  modify  close_write  open  filename
5      3       1            1     coffee/script.coffee

Sublime Text 3 on Linux

Given a file coffee/script.coffee and watching the coffee dir:

% inotifywait -m coffee
Setting up watches.
Watches established.
./ CREATE .sublc0f.tmp
./ OPEN .sublc0f.tmp
./ ATTRIB .sublc0f.tmp
./ MODIFY .sublc0f.tmp
./ CLOSE_WRITE,CLOSE .sublc0f.tmp
./ ATTRIB .sublc0f.tmp
./ MOVED_FROM .sublc0f.tmp
./ MOVED_TO script.coffee

Note how there's only 1 event on the file guard watches: MOVED_TO.

(This is because Sublime calls rename() without deleting the file, which makes Guard think it's a new file, which calls the run_on_additions plugin method - a method many guard plugins don't implement).

Kate

Details:

1. Kate creates a backup file, e.g. foo.rb -> foo.rb~ (suffix is configurable)

2. Kate uses QTemporaryFile with a template "XXXXXX.new", which means e.g. foo.rb -> foo.rbo53241.new (see: qtemporaryfile.cpp)

3. Kate uses "overwrite" technique to allow saving file in read-only directories: foo.rbo53241.new -> foo.rb (no delete happens)

E.g.:

[:delete]: users_controller_spec.rb~
[:moved_to, :move]: users_controller_spec.rb~
[:attrib]: users_controller_spec.rb~
[:create]: users_controller_spec.rbo22583.new
[:attrib]: users_controller_spec.rbo22583.new
[:close_write, :close]: users_controller_spec.rbo22583.new
[:close_write, :close]: users_controller_spec.rbo22583.new
[:moved_from, :move]: users_controller_spec.rbo22583.new
[:moved_to, :move]: users_controller_spec.rb

Vim

total  attrib  move_self  delete_self  filename
4      1       1          1            coffee/script.coffee

Details: The events Vim generates during saving actually depends on options, e.g. backup/backupdir/patchmode/backupcopy/writebackup/backupskip

Gedit

total  access  attrib  close_write  close_nowrite  open  delete_self  filename
8      1       1       1            1              2     1            coffee/script.coffee

Nano

total  modify  close_write  open  filename
5      3       1            1     coffee/script.coffee

Joe

total  access  modify  attrib  close_write  close_nowrite  open  filename
10     1       4       1       1            1              2     coffee/script.coffee

JEdit

total  move_self  filename
1      1          coffee/script.coffee

SciTE

total  modify  close_write  open  filename
5      3       1            1     coffee/script.coffee

Bluefish

total  attrib  close_write  open  filename
4      2       1            1     coffee/script.coffee

echo 'foo' > coffee/test.txt

total  modify  close_write  open  filename
4      2       1            1     coffee/test.txt

Redcar 0.12

total  modify  close_write  open  filename
4      2       1            1     coffee/script.coffee

emacs 24

total  access  modify  close_write  close_nowrite  open  filename
9      1       2       1            2              3     my/fine/file

sed

Sed uses the "overwrite with move" trick.

from running: `sed -e 's/a/b/' -i index.html`

./ OPEN index.html
./ CREATE sedBF20nx
./ OPEN sedBF20nx
./ MODIFY sedBF20nx
./ MODIFY sedBF20nx
./ MODIFY sedBF20nx
./ MODIFY sedBF20nx
./ ATTRIB sedBF20nx
./ ATTRIB sedBF20nx
./ CLOSE_NOWRITE,CLOSE index.html
./ CLOSE_WRITE,CLOSE sedBF20nx
./ MOVED_FROM sedBF20nx
./ MOVED_TO index.html