Path: utzoo!attcan!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!usc!wuarchive!udel!haven!adm!smoke!gwyn
From: gwyn@smoke.BRL.MIL (Doug Gwyn)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.questions
Subject: Re: sparse files
Message-ID: <11813@smoke.BRL.MIL>
Date: 14 Dec 89 08:16:36 GMT
References: <21581@adm.BRL.MIL> <235@dg.dg.com> <2700@auspex.auspex.com> <1989Dec13.172444.27531@esegue.segue.boston.ma.us>
Reply-To: gwyn@brl.arpa (Doug Gwyn)
Organization: Ballistic Research Lab (BRL), APG, MD.
Lines: 8

One problem with sparse files is that simply updating (i.e., reading a
record, modifying it, and writing it back on top of the original record)
can result in an I/O failure if the original record overlapped a hole
and the file system doesn't have any more free data blocks.

I don't offer a solution for this, just a warning that even I/O
operations that "can't" fail might, so applications should always
check and be prepared to recover.