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Fork ○꠹｜Definition｜1st｜20251119205401-00-⌔
Fork (file system) - Wikipedia
Fork (file system)
In a computer file system, a fork is a set of data associated with a file-system object. File systems without forks only allow a single set of data for the contents, while file systems with forks allow multiple such contents. Every non-empty file must have at least one fork, often of default type, and depending on the file system, a file may have one or more other associated forks, which in turn may contain primary data integral to the file, or just metadata.
Unlike extended attributes, a similar file system feature which is typically of fixed size, forks can be of variable size, possibly even larger than the file’s primary data fork. The size of a file is the sum of the sizes of each fork.
Popular file systems that can use forks include Apple’s HFS+ and Microsoft’s NTFS.
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