Microsoft KB Archive/231388

= Sparse Files Use Quota Equal to Total Allocated Length =

Article ID: 231388

Article Last Modified on 2/26/2007

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APPLIES TO


 * Microsoft Windows 2000 Server
 * Microsoft Windows 2000 Advanced Server
 * Microsoft Windows 2000 Datacenter Server
 * Microsoft Windows 2000 Professional Edition

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This article was previously published under Q231388



SUMMARY
This article describes the behavior of sparse files in a file system with quotas enforced.



MORE INFORMATION
An attributes called "sparseness" is available in the NTFS file system for Windows 2000. Sparseness describes a file that is allocated at a specific size and has smaller amounts of data surrounded by 00 bytes. With this attribute, if you create a 100-MB file with 1 MB of data present, the file occupies only slightly more than 1 MB of space in the file system.

This can affect the degree to which a sparse file impacts your quota on a drive. By design, a sparse file reserves its full size. The file can grow to that size if you write to it.

For example, if you have a quota of 200 MB, and you write 1 MB of data to a 50-MB sparse file, your quota for that volume is reduced by 50 MB.

Keywords: kbenv kbinfo KB231388

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