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lang-bash
wc -c <"$FILENAME"gives the size with no other cruft, thussize=$(wc -c <"$FILENAME").wc -c < fileseems to be very fast, at least on OS X. I'm guessing that wc has the brains to try to stat the file if only -c is specified.wc -cusesfstat, but then seeks to second-last block of the file and reads the last up-tost_blksizebytes. Apparently this is because files in Linux's/procand/sysfor example have stat sizes that are only approximate, andwcwants to report the actual size, not the stat-reported size. I guess it would be weird forwc -cto report a different size thanwc, but it's not idea to read data from the file if it's a normal disk file, and it's not in memory. Or worse, near-line tape storage...printfstill sees the indentation, e.g.printf "Size: $size"->size: <4 spaces> 54339. On the other handechoignores the whitespace. Any way to make it consistent?fstat. Try runningstrace wc -c </etc/passwdand you can see what it is doing.