On Wed, Sep 22, 2010 at 09:59:20AM +0100, Matthew Booth wrote:
 Except read and write from a block device, although that could be
 fixed with new APIs. 
Um yes indeed.  pwrite-device, pread-device.
 Also, as I said before, I think the handle-based API is a good
 alternative for large data-transfer. I don't think your hexedit
 experience was a good example. For example, I would expect using
 hread to be less code than using pread for reading the contents of a
 file into memory in chunks. 
A filename can be used as a handle, except it is a handle that doesn't
need to be opened or closed, so the code simply has to be shorter.
But anyhow if you post the actual code involved then I can try out
both APIs.
The issue with hexedit was managing the handles, specifically making
sure they are closed along all paths.
Rich.
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