
The 20th and 21st byte specify which sector of the device the first chunk of the file is stored in.Īs long as your computer system knows those rules and can follow them, it can use a storage device formatted with that file system.The 13th byte of the row specifies whether the file requires a password to read, modify, or delete.The first 11 bytes of the row define the file or folder name, represented as (8 characters).(3 characters).Each folder is defined as its own table with a row for every file or folder that is a member of that folder.The File Allocation Table (FAT) file system, first published by Microsoft in 1977, is a good example to use for illustration. The rules that create the architecture are part of the file system. It finds out the sector of the device where the first part of that file is written.It checks to see if you have permission to open that file.It checks if there is a file in that folder named video.mov.The computer figures out where the Desktop folder is in the folder hierarchy.To better understand it, think about some of the things that happens when you open a file on your desktop named video.mov What is a file system?Ī file system is the way that data is structured on a storage device. And if you are also using a lot of portable drives, you should consider exFAT as well. All of them use the same file system, exFAT. They range in size from 500 GB solid state disks the size of a credit card to a 126 TB RAID 5 array with its own rollaway case. We use a lot of portable drives at the library. ExFAT: A File System for Your Portable Drives
