Re: Behavior of fwrite(), fseek(), fflush() if the file gets deleted after being opened.

Aditya <adityagupta.18@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> writes:
> I am using Red Hat linux 9 and gcc 3.4.
> I am writing an application in C with file handling. The application
> opens a file(creates it at run time) using fopen() in binary write
> mode. The file is open until the application exits.
>
> The application starts and opens(creates) a file, and waits for an
> input to be written to the file.
> I delete the file using rm -f <filename> as soon as the application
> starts before I give it an input to the application(just to clarify, I
> delete it from a different terminal, without stopping the application
> to wait for an input).
> Now I give the input and debug through the application, I find that
> the fseek(), fwrite(), fflush() calls in the application for writing
> to the file do not throw error even though the file is not existant.
> I cannot understand, where is that data written. If it is wriiten to
> the buffer, then fflush() should have re****ted error. But it also
> succeeds.
[...]

The C standard doesn't specify what happens when one process is access
a file and another processes deletes that file.  In fact, the C
standard doesn't even deal with multiple processes at all.

As it happens, the behavior you're seeing is typical of Unix-like
systems.  <OT>You didn't really delete the file; you merely unlinked
it.</OT> For more information, try comp.unix.programmer.

[Reply e-mailed as well as posted.]

-- 
Keith Thompson (The_Other_Keith) <kst-u@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>
Nokia
"We must do something.  This is something.  Therefore, we must do this."
    -- Antony Jay and Jonathan Lynn, "Yes Minister"
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