1. In a file server system having server computers and storage shared among the server computers, the shared storage containing a file system, access to the file system being managed by one of the server computers that is primary with respect to the file system, other server computers being secondary with respect to the file system, a method comprising: one of the server computers that is secondary with respect to the file system responding to a request from a client for creating, deleting, or renaming a file in the file system by requesting an exclusive lock on a source or target directory containing the file from the server computer that is primary with respect to the file system, and the server computer that is primary with respect to the file system responding to said one of the server computers that is secondary with respect to the file system by the server computer that is primary with respect to the file system granting an exclusive lock on the source or target directory and returning a copy of an inode of the source or target directory to said one of the server computers that is secondary with respect to the file system; and said one of the server computers that is secondary with respect to the file system modifying the inode of the source or target directory in order to create, delete, or rename the file in the file system.