Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rpi!usc!wuarchive!uunet!midway!quads.uchicago.edu!smk5
From: smk5@quads.uchicago.edu (stephen mortimer kramarsky)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.next
Subject: Help! Something ate my diskspace!
Message-ID: <1991Apr27.230530.26089@midway.uchicago.edu>
Date: 27 Apr 91 23:05:30 GMT
Sender: news@midway.uchicago.edu (NewsMistress)
Organization: University of Chicago
Lines: 25

Hi again from your friendly neighborhood novice,

  I have a tiny little problem I was hoping you could help me with:  I
tried to open a file in Edit which obviously was not designed to be so opened.
After a great deal of disk activity during which the "## MB available on hard
disk" in the upper left of my "File Viewer" dropped to NONE! from 21.5 MB, I
managed to regain control.

  All the time, the Edit window claimed it was trying to open the file
which was, as you have by now guessed, some sort of binary. 

  I threw out the file and restarted the machine which brought the "available"
disk space from NONE to 16.1 MB.  My question is, where is my other 5.4 megs?
I read somewhere about something called a "core dump," but being a law student,
not a unix jock, I don't know what that is.  Could such a thing have happened?
What would it mean?  I've looked in the tmp directory for big files and found
none.  I've also run fsck but it has no effect (should it?) I'm out of obvious
ideas and those are tho only kind I have.

  Please e-mail me any help you can.

  Thanks in advance,

    Steve "Getting to be a pain in the net"  Kramarsky
    SMK5@quads.uchichago.edu