Re: [tlug] Files copied to USB thumb drive completely gone

[Attila Kinali <attila@example.com>]

Moin,

On Tue, 03 Nov 2009 01:05:18 +0900
Dave M G <dave@example.com> wrote:

> Even if I yanked it out before it finished synchronizing, shouldn't
> there at least be partial files? We're talking about lots of text files,
> not one large video file, so I would imagine that getting half way
> through would mean half the files present.

Depends on what is written in which order.
It often happens that the file data is written before the file system
data is written. Ie you'd first write down the files, then the
data describing where to find the files. And without the later there
is no chance to find the data.

Especially file systems with an prehistoric structure like FAT
are really prone to such problems. ext2/3, zfs, btrfs less so
because of certain guarantees they give on data/metadata consistency.
 
> It seems odd to me that even if there was some kind of error that the
> drive would be so *completely* empty.

There is probably a chance that you still have some data left,
but it's not referenced by the file system.

			Attila Kinali

-- 
The trouble with you, Shev, is you don't say anything until you've saved
up a whole truckload of damned heavy brick arguments and then you dump
them all out and never look at the bleeding body mangled beneath the heap
		-- Tirin, The Dispossessed, U. Le Guin