file Definition file A file is a mass of bits that has been given a name and is stored on a nonvolatile medium. These bits may form ASCII characters or machine-executable data. Under the COHERENT system and related operating systems, external devices can mimic files, in that they can be opened, closed, read, and written to in a manner identical to that of files. To manipulate the contents of a file, you must first open it. This can be done with the COHERENT system call open, or with the function fopen. You can then read the file, write material to it, or append material onto it with the COHERENT system calls read and write, or with the functions fread and fwrite. See the entries on COHERENT system calls and entry STDIO for more infor- mation on manipulating material within a file. ***** See Also ***** close(), definitions, executable file, fopen(), fclose(), FILE, open() COHERENT Lexicon Page 1