Newbie loop device question

Hello, I did the following: 1. losetupdev-loop0foo-bar 2. rmfoo-bar 3. mountdev-loop0foo-dummy 4. cdfoo-dummy 5. touch toto 6. cd 7. umountdev-loop0 If I remountdev-loop0 again, the file toto is there, even though the filefoo-bar that was attached to the loop device did not exist anymore. My newbie (and probably dumb) question is: Where is the data written to if a loop device is used to which no file is attached anymore? Thanks in advance for your patience and help ;o)

Beleive it or not, the data is being written to the file that used to be attached to the namefoo-bar. The data is still on the disk, and the file isn't deleted until all the refernces to it are removed. The directory entry is only one reference, a program opening the file creates another reference that exists until the file is closed.

The kernel is keeping the file open (and thus not deleted) while the loop device is defined.

'losetup -ddev-loop0' will break this link and the data will be deleted from the disk. Rebooting will also break the link todev-loop0

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