FileStream no longer synchronizes file offset with OS

Article
2022-11-04

To improve performance, FileStream no longer synchronizes the file offset with the operating system.

Change description

In previous .NET versions, FileStream synchronizes the file offset with the Windows operating system (OS) when it reads or writes to a file. It synchronizes the offset by calling SetFilePointer, which is an expensive system call. Starting in .NET 6, FileStream no longer synchronizes the file offset, and instead just keeps the offset in memory. FileStream.Position always returns the current offset, but if you obtain the file handle from FileStream.SafeFileHandle and query the OS for the current file offset using a system call, the offset value will be 0.

The following code shows how the file offset differs between previous .NET versions and .NET 6.

[DllImport("kernel32.dll")]
private static extern bool SetFilePointerEx(SafeFileHandle hFile, long liDistanceToMove, out long lpNewFilePointer, uint dwMoveMethod);

byte[] bytes = new byte[10_000];
string path = Path.Combine(Path.GetTempPath(), Path.GetTempFileName());

using (FileStream fs = new FileStream(path, FileMode.Create, FileAccess.ReadWrite, FileShare.None, bufferSize: 4096, useAsync: true))
{
    SafeFileHandle handle = fs.SafeFileHandle;

    await fs.WriteAsync(bytes, 0, bytes.Length);
    Console.WriteLine(fs.Position); // 10000 in all versions

    if (SetFilePointerEx(handle, 0, out long currentOffset, 1 /* get current offset */))
    {
        Console.WriteLine(currentOffset);  // 10000 in .NET 5, 0 in .NET 6
    }
}

Version introduced

.NET 6

Reason for change

This change was introduced to improve the performance of asynchronous reads and writes and to address the following issues:

With this change, ReadAsync operations are up to two times faster, and WriteAsync operations are up to five times faster.

Recommended action

Modify any code that relied on the offset being synchronized.
To enable the .NET 5 behavior in .NET 6, specify an AppContext switch or an environment variable. By setting the switch to true, you opt out of all performance improvements made to FileStream in .NET 6.
```
{
    "configProperties": {
        "System.IO.UseNet5CompatFileStream": true
    }
}
```
```
set DOTNET_SYSTEM_IO_USENET5COMPATFILESTREAM=1
```
Note

This switch is only available in .NET 6. It was removed in .NET 7.

Affected APIs

None.

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