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.TH VIREC v1.4
.SH NAME
virec - Recover the modified version of a file after a crash
.SH SYNOPSIS
.nf
\fBvirec\fP [\fB-d\fP \fItmpdir\fP] \fItextfilename...\fP
\fBvirec\fP </tmp/elv\fIXXX\fP
.fi
.SH DESCRIPTION
\fIVirec\fP is a program which extracts the most recent version of a
text file from a temporary file in /tmp.
.PP
When you edit a file with Elvis,
only about 5K bytes of the file are stored in RAM;
the rest is stored in a file in /tmp.
This allows you to edit files larger than a process' data space.
It also plays a big part in the way that "undo" and "paste" were implemented.
.PP
The \fIvirec\fP program basically extracts the "undo" version from the file.
This is most useful when the system (or Elvis) crashes in
the middle of a long edit session,
since the "undo" version of the file contains everything
except your last change.
Nearly all of your work can be salvaged.
.PP
The most common way to invoke virec is this:
You just give virec the name of the file you were editing,
and it finds the matching file in /tmp and writes
the newest available version of the file over the existing version.
It then deletes the /tmp file.
.PP
The other way, where you redirect its stdin to come from
a particular /tmp file, is used when you have
either forgotten which file that is and you want to see its contents,
or when you want to recover the file
without losing either the /tmp file or the current version of the text file.
.SH OPTIONS
.IP "\fB-d\fP \fItmpdir\fP"
If your \fI.exrc\fP or \fI$EXINIT\fP causes Elvis to store temp files in
a non-standard directory
(usually, anyplace other than /tmp),
then you must tell \fIvirec\fP which directory to look in.
.SH FILES
.IP /tmp/elv*
The temporary file left over from when Elvis was editing a text file.
.SH AUTHOR
.nf
Steve Kirkendall
[email protected]
\&...uunet!tektronix!psueea!eecs!kirkenda
.fi

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