.TH FMTARENAS 8
.SH NAME
fmtarenas \- format a file into a number of Venti arenas
.SH SYNOPSIS
.B venti/fmtarenas
[
.B -Z
]
[
.B -a
.I arenasize
]
[
.B -b
.I blocksize
]
.I name
.I file
.SH DESCRIPTION
.I Fmtarenas
formats the given
.IR file ,
typically a disk partition, into a number of
.IR venti (8)
arenas.
The arenas are given names of the form
.IR name%d ,
where
.I %d
is replaced with a sequential number starting at 0.
.PP
Option to 
.I fmtarenas
are:
.TP
.BI -a " arenasize
The arenas are of
.I arenasize
bytes.  The default is 512 megabytes, which was selected to provide a balance
between the number of arenas and the ability to copy an arena to external
media such as recordable CDs and tapes.
.TP
.BI -b " blocksize
The size, in bytes, for read and write operations to the file.
The size is recorded in the file, and is used by applications that access the arenas.
The default is 8k.
.TP
.B -Z
Do not zero the data sections of the arenas.
Using this option reduces the formatting time
but should only be used when it is known that the file was already zeroed.
.PP
The units for the various sizes can be specified by appending
.LR k ,
.LR m ,
or
.LR g
to indicate kilobytes, megabytes, or gigabytes respectively.
.SH SOURCE
.B /sys/src/cmd/venti
.SH "SEE ALSO"
.IR venti (8),
.IR fmtisect (8),
.IR fmtindex (8)
