Huge file patches

[Honen, Oren]

Hi all, I have a huge ASCII file ( 500M ) in a release I have. I need to patch this file in several different ways for each release. These files are then being read by  a commercial application. Currently we just create several copies and patch each of them differently. The changes are several lines only. I’m thinking of writing an application that will create a dummy file. When this file is read the application will return a data based on the original file and a diff file. I thought of using /proc fs for that so when reading this file, a callback routine will be activated. As far as I looked this is possible but only with kmodule and/or device driver ( and using /dev ). The problem is that I need all of this in user space with NO root privilegese. Other solution might be massing with i-node with some parts pointing to the original file and other parts pointing at fixed lines files. I believe this solution is worst as it involves to much hacking.   1. Do you think it is possible – The first solution ? 2. Do you know of any existing solution ? 3. Please share your ideas.   Thanks Oren Honen