large file

[unknownsoldier]

what is the largest file i can upload.
i need to upload a 2.50 gigabyte file i am allowed to do this on your servers?
the file is not illegal or anything. it just happens to be large.
thanks for your time

[Jonathan]

Assuming the following points, I do no think it'd be a problem:

1. It is not illegal, etc.
2. Your account has enough space.

[Frank Hagan]

You may have some trouble with your FTP client; I think most have a 2GB file size limit. You might need to break the file up into smaller chunks. I have heard that some of the FTP clients now support up to 5GB file size, like ProFTP.

To see if the server OS was compiled to allow large files, log in with SSH and enter the "ulimit -a" command:

-jailshell-2.05b$ ulimit -a
core file size (blocks, -c) 0
data seg size (kbytes, -d) unlimited
file size (blocks, -f) unlimited
max locked memory (kbytes, -l) 4
max memory size (kbytes, -m) unlimited
open files (-n) 1024
pipe size (512 bytes, -p) 8
stack size (kbytes, -s) 10240
cpu time (seconds, -t) unlimited
max user processes (-u) 7168
virtual memory (kbytes, -v) unlimited

Third item down on my server says the "file size" is "unlimited" (cpanel08), so the operating system isn't restricting it. If my unused disk space isn't large enough, the file will not upload and appear as a zero byte file in the file directory (took me a while to figure out what was happening one time, because I never noticed the error message!)

[openbox]

You may have some trouble with your FTP client; I think most have a 2GB file size limit.

Huh? I've never had a limit uploading/downloading large files with any FTP client. I've done hundreds of GBs at a time before. After all, this is what FTP is designed to do.

[Frank Hagan]

I've run into it before ... but then I remember when a 2GB file was unthinkable. Perhaps all FTP clients now support file sizes up to the 8 terabytes that Linux compiled with LFS supports.

Having file sizes above 2GB is a "special" on any 32-bit Linux OS, but most are compiled with the switches that way now ("LFS" support). The old math used to be that since Linux ports for 32-bit CPUs use 32-bit integers for file access and locking, the maximum size is 2^31 - 1 = 2GB. (Had to look that one up; I can never remember this stuff). LFS, named after the "Large File System" committee, allows up to 8 terabytes or something!

[openbox]

Ahh, gotcha now. Yes there is/was a 2GB file size limit. My confusion was in how I read your post. It's not an FTP client restriction per se, its a filesystem limitation.

[Frank Hagan]

Actually, I did mean that some FTP clients may have a filesize limitation. I seem to remember getting stung by that, but I could be wrong. I was trying to think if I ever ran into it with ws_ftp, and I couldn't find anything on it. So, as Rosanne Anna Danna said, "never mind".

[ChrisTech]

Hmm, I've never seen any limitations with large files sizes such as those. I just got down tarring up a website thats 4.5 gigs, that I then downloaded via flashfxp (ftp program) to my own hard drive, then burnt to a dvdr for the guy (he has dialup out in BFE).

On a 9x machine you might have an issue.