Re: handling of files > 2GB

[Bob Proulx]

> I inadvertantly generated during a backup session with tar files which -
> obviously - are greater than 2 GB. the space occupied appears in "df ."
> - however trying to "rm" this file this is not possible
> 
> the errormessage is:
> 
> rm: cannot remove `backup-share.tar': Value too large for defined data
> type
> 
> what could I do to remove that file ?

Your version of GNU fileutils were apparently not configured to
support large files.  They do support large files when compiled to do
so.

Purely as a workaround I would suggest different things.  At least one
should work.

I am sure the perl fans will suggest this.  But this again requires
perl to be configured for large files.

  perl -e 'unlink("backup-share.tar");'

So let's try to hit it more directly.  Truncate the file first.  That
will make it small and then you can remove it.  The shell will do this
when redirecting the output of commands.

  true > backup-share.tar
  rm backup-share.tar

However, if your shell was not compiled for large files then the
redirection will fail.  In that case we have to resort to more subtle
methods.  Since tar created the file then tar must be configured to
support large files.  Use that to your advantage to truncate the file.

  touch /tmp/junk
  tar cvf backup-share.tar /tmp/junk

Hope that helps
Bob