Should i delete core files ?

UNIX for Beginners Q & A
1

Good morning, i need your help please

By searching some of the largest files i found some core files that take up much space

This is the command:

find ./ -type f -name core -exec file {} \;

Output:

./xptol/tel/tasacion/CIERR/exe/core:    ELF 64-bit MSB core file SPARCV9 Version 1, from 'batch_borrar'
./xptol/tel/tasacion/CIERR/PARCIAL/core:        ELF 64-bit MSB core file SPARCV9 Version 1, from 'batch_borrar'
./xptol/tel/tasacion/RECEP/core:        ELF 32-bit MSB core file SPARC Version 1, from 'sleep'
./xptol/shell/core:     ELF 64-bit MSB core file SPARCV9 Version 1, from 'sqlplus'

and some of then are larger

roduccion/explotacion # ls -lrth ./xptol/tel/tasacion/CIERR/exe/core 
-rw-------   1 xptol    explotacion     14G Sep 22  2017 ./xptol/tel/tasacion/CIERR/exe/core
/produccion/explotacion # 
/produccion/explotacion # ls -lrth ./xptol/tel/tasacion/CIERR/PARCIAL/core
-rw-------   1 xptol    explotacion    2.4G Sep 20  2008 ./xptol/tel/tasacion/CIERR/PARCIAL/core

I wonder if i can remove these files without affecting any application or the operating system itself?

Thanks for your help in advanced

2

Deleting core files will not affect the current running application.
It has crashed (in the past) and generated a core dump.
Or killed intentionally to generate one by user or kernel.

Now, the one who wrote those applications, should tell you that.
Perhaps he or she (or a group, company whatever) would like to analyse those core dumps to determine the reason of crash.

Hope that helps
Regards
Peasant.

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3

If you have a process that generates repeated core dumps, you have a problem. On production systems you want to see no core dumps.

A process that dumps core may leave a data set in an indeterminate state. Example: missing child records for a parent record. We had missing closure records for successfully (we think) closed service requests. Convincing management of the cause was interesting, but as soon as the faulty code was fixed the problem went away.

As Peasant indicated you can safely remove them. That cleans the slate. Start worrying if more appear.

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