how to make constraints on the size of any file

[kosamoza]

If I have a file in which data is written which leads to the increase of this file size
Is it possible to make a constraint such that this file size mustn't exceed certain size
let say 5 MB for instance

Thanks in advance

[yancek]

The site below gives an explanation of how to do this:

File size limit exceeded error under Linux and solution

[Mudgen]

limits.conf fsize sets limits per user, per group, or globally for _any_ file, not specific files. Although the thread title says "any file", the OP seems to want to apply specific files. I don't know the answer.

[kosamoza]

actually yes it not for all files it's for certain files
so you are telling me here that it can be done for user or group so how can this be done
for certain user ? or certain group ?

[Mudgen]

I'm saying that the link Yancek posted does _not_ show how to do it for specific files, only globally for all files. Maybe he'll check back in with more help.

[drl]

Hi.

More information would be useful.

What do you think should happen if a file exceeds the specified size? Abort, exit gracefully, fill up another file, rotate among n files (keeping the last n), etc.?

One way you can do it is to create a filesytem of a certain size. For testing I often have:

Filesystem            Size  Used Avail Use% Mounted on
/dev/md2              7.6M  1.1M  6.1M  15% /small

So if you are using LVM that is fairly easy.

Another way is to require the use of a filter (that you would write) that does something when the limit is reached:

./a.out | my-size-limit 5M

Best wishes ... cheers, drl

[sarmed]

I don't know whether this will help, but it's worth checking

http://sarmed-quota.blogspot.com

7. Set quota for user Harry so that when user Harry types dd=/dev/zero of=file bs=1024K count=4 he succeeds, but when he types dd=/dev/zero of=file bs=1024K count=8 he fails.
The command dd=/dev/zero of=file bs=1024K count=4 creates a file that is 4KB in size. Count=8 creates a 8KB file. So, we have to define quota so that soft limit is 4KB and hard limit is 8KB.
Because we have to define quota for a user, we have to implement quota to the partition containing his home directory. If there is no /home partition, we implement quota in / partition.
#df –h //to find out the partition containing /home

vim /etc/fstab

/dev/hdaX /home ext3 defaults,quota 0 0
add


#mount -o remount //remounts all the partitions;-o==options

#quotacheck -cM /home //-c==check, -M==modify

#quotaon /home

#edquota Harry //edit quota for user Harry….all information here is in kilobytes

partition blocks soft hard inode soft hard
/dev/hdaX do not edit 4096 8192 do not edit do not edit do not edit

#repquota -v /home //report quota verbosely for /home
OR
#repquota –va //reports all existing quotas