Re: Delete a file THAT big? Surely you are joking.

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From: =?iso-8859-1?b?U+liYXN0aWVu?= Aperghis-Tramoni
Subject: Re: Delete a file THAT big? Surely you are joking.
Date: 16:52 on 18 Dec 2006
Yossi Kreinin wrote:

> >> I removed it using rm. I don't know what you mean.
> >
> > Most likely the files were still open anyway. Did you make sure that
> > the processes had closed them? (using lsof and/or fuser).
> >
> > I've had plenty of big files on ext2/3 and it does delete them.
>
> I think I eliminated all traces of semi-intelligent life on that machine,
> killing all processes I could. Maybe it's not ext* but some other filesystem.
> Or maybe you are right and the files were still open. That's hateful on much
> more levels than a mere filesystem bug:

It's not a filesystem bug but a Unix feature, present since a very long time.

> * Why didn't rm say they were open?

I'm not sure it can know.

> * And by which process, so I'd know if it's OK to kill it?

As Martin said, lsof(8) and fuser(1) are your friends.

> * Why did unmounting the filesystem succeed, instead of saying the processes
> still need it?

Maybe because by that time, you had killed the process that was holding
the file?

--
Sébastien Aperghis-Tramoni

Close the world, txEn eht nepO.
There's stuff above here

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