Raw vs. block device. I'm confused.

[scw%ucla-locus at cepu.UUCP]

From:  Steve Woods <cepu!scw at ucla-locus>


	    I seem to remember a warning once that doing a read on a raw 
    .
    .
    .
    end of buffer! 

	    Is this true?  Does it depend on the device controller?

No, but it does depend on the controller. All DEC controllers will read as
many bytes as you tell them to read, when writing however they will write a full
sector (disks) padding the sector with zero bytes up to its full length. Tape
records will exactly as long as you tell them to be, within the limits of the
controller (some tape controllers require an even number of bytes).
<scw>