Glossary of Data Communications TermsCourtesy Enterprise-Wide Computing, Inc. |
Term:
file allocation table (FAT)
Definition: A FAT keeps track of file locations in a particular volume. NetWare divides each volume into blocks. NetWare stores files on the volume in these blocks. If the file consists of one or more blocks, the file may be stored in blocks that are not adjacent. The FAT keeps track of the block numbers where different parts of the file are located. To retrieve a file, NetWare searches through the FAT until it finds the FAT entries and corresponding block numbers for the requested file. |