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Computing (FOLDOC) dictionary (also found in English - Vietnamese, English - English (Wordnet), )
sponge
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A special case of a Unix filter that reads its entire
input before writing any output; the canonical example is a
sort utility. Unlike most filters, a sponge can conveniently
overwrite the input file with the output data stream. If a
file system has file versioning (as ITS did and VMS does
now) the sponge/filter distinction loses its usefulness,
because directing filter output would just write a new
version.