Tell the linux kernel to put a file in the disk cache?

Posted by Rory on Server Fault See other posts from Server Fault or by Rory
Published on 2012-07-10T09:14:43Z Indexed on 2012/07/10 9:16 UTC
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linux

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cache

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kernel

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file

Is there any command to for a file to be read in and loaded into the linux disk cache? This is on an up-to-date debian system.

I know in the general case, it's better to let the linux kernel figure this out. But I have an edge case. I have a laptop that has an NFS director mounted, and i want to play a long video file, but I don't want to have a network problem interrupt the playnig. I know that (largeish) file will be read in it's entirety later on. I know that nothing else (really) will be running while playing this video. There is enough free memory to store this file.

(I know I could just copy the file into a new tmpfs filesystem, but I'm curious if there's an even shorter way to do it)

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