Question

I would like to read a large file that has a structure similar to the following:

        John  10  department
        Hello 14   kjezlkjzlkj
        jhfekh 144 lkjzlkjrzlj
        ........

The problem is I want to minimize the number of I/O access to the disk while reading this file in C++. Is there a way to access the file on Disk, then read a large portion of the file to memory ( that 1 disk access), then read a second large portion of the file ( 2nd disk access…Etc)?

Any help will be appreciated.

Answer 1

Just create a large buffer and fill it up with one read. Repeat if necessary.

The streams (stdio) implements this. You can use fopen and then use setbuffer

EDIT

It is rather simple

   /* 5MB - Can increase or decrease this to your hearts content */
   #define BUFFER_SIZE 5242880

   char buffer[BUFFER_SIZE];
   file = fopen("filename", "r");
   setbuffer(file, buffer, BUFFER_SIZE);

Then use any of the operations to read fscanf, fgets etc.

EDIT

Sorry did not notice it was C++

Here is the code for C++

#include <iostream>
#include <fstream>
using namespace std;

...

const int BUFFER_SIZE = 5242880;

filebuf fb;
char buffer[BUFFER_SIZE];
fb.setbuf(buffer, BUFFER_SIZE);
fb.open ("test.txt",ios::in);
istream is(&fb);

Then can use int i; is >> i

etc

Happy now Tino Didriksen