holes in files

[Rob Lemley]

In <6193:Dec618:43:4390 at kramden.acf.nyu.edu> brnstnd at kramden.acf.nyu.edu (Dan Bernstein) writes:

>In article <1990Dec05.155248.8929 at iecc.cambridge.ma.us> johnl at iecc.cambridge.ma.us (John R. Levine) writes:

>> For that reason, an entirely reasonable strategy is always to leave a hole
>> when writing a full block of zeros.

>This is poor advice. An application may depend on the sizes of files it
>creates.

Examples please.  As stated before, when READING a file (ie: via open/read),
there is NO WAY to determine if a block of zeros constituted an actual hole
in the file or a disk block full of zeros.

Rob
---
Rob Lemley                               205-730-1546
System Consultant, Scanning Software
INTERGRAPH Corp                          ...!uunet!ingr!b15!rob
Huntsville, AL                       OR  b15!rob at ingr.com