/usr/bin/fallocate -v -d -l 2 myfile takes forever

[Mark Geisert]

On 3/5/2024 12:46 AM, Cedric Blancher via Cygwin wrote:
> On Mon, 29 Jan 2024 at 10:46, Mark Geisert via Cygwin <cygwin@cygwin.com> wrote:
>>
>> On 1/28/2024 11:56 PM, Mark Geisert via Cygwin wrote:
>>> On 1/28/2024 10:44 PM, Cedric Blancher via Cygwin wrote:
>>>> Good morning!
>>>>
>>>> rm -f myfile
>>>> touch myfile
>>>> /usr/bin/fallocate -v -d -l myfile takes forever with latest Cygwin 3.5
>>>                                ^ length goes here, before filename
>>>
>>> I believe you need to
>>>       chattr +S myfile
>>> after the 'touch' to make the file sparsifiable.
>>>
>>> Also, I'm unsure if '-d' makes sense when initially allocating a sparse
>>> file.  If I leave it off, fallocate does the right thing.
>>>
>>> I'm separately investigating the 'takes forever' report.
>>
>> It's taking forever because it's in an infinite loop looking for data
>> followed by a hole, which is not present in a new file being created.
>> This is due to the '-d' option being specified.  fallocate ought to
>> diagnose this condition rather than looping forever, but here we are.
>>
>> It's possible we have an old fallocate from an old util-linux package.
>> I'll try to investigate this further when I have time.
>>
> 
> Any update on this issue?

Thanks for the reminder. I'll check repology to see if we can maybe 
support a newer util-linux. No guarantees its fallocate is any better, 
but lets first see if it builds at all. Give me a couple days, please.

..mark