Next: , Previous: , Up: Top   [Contents][Index]


2 Introduction

fswatch is a file change monitor that receives notifications when the contents of the specified files or directories are modified. fswatch interacts with the operating system using a monitor. Currently, the following kinds of monitors are available:

fswatch should build and work correctly on any system shipping either of the aforementioned APIs.

2.1 History and fswatch Authors

Alan DIPERT wrote the first implementation of fswatch in 2009. This version ran exclusively on Apple OS X and relied on the FSEvents API to get change events from the OS.

At the end of 2013 Enrico M. CRISOSTOMO wrote fsw aiming at providing not only a drop-in replacement for fswatch, but also a tool portable across as many operating systems as possible. Besides adding support to other operating systems, fsw introduced new features such as inclusion and exclusion filters and customizable output formats.

In April 2014 Alan and Enrico, in the best interest of users of either fswatch and fsw, agreed on merging the two programs together. At the same time, Enrico was taking over fswatch as a maintainer. As a consequence, development of fswatch has continued on its main repository while the fsw repository has been frozen.

2.2 Reporting Bugs and Suggestions

If you find problems or have suggestions about this program or this manual, please report them as new issues in the official GitHub repository of fswatch at https://github.com/emcrisostomo/fswatch. Please, read the CONTRIBUTING.md file for detailed instructions on how to contribute to fswatch.


Next: , Previous: , Up: Top   [Contents][Index]