Question

Distinguish between sequential access files and random access files.

Answer 1

Comparing random versus sequential operations is one way of assessing application efficiency in terms of disk use. Accessing data sequentially is much faster than accessing it randomly because of the way in which the disk hardware works. The seek operation, which occurs when the disk head positions itself at the right disk cylinder to access data requested, takes more time than any other part of the I/O process. Because reading randomly involves a higher number of seek operations than does sequential reading, random reads deliver a lower rate of throughput. The same is true for random writing.

Answer 2

Sequential Access to a data file means that the computer system reads or writes information to the file sequentially, starting from the beginning of the file and proceeding step by step. ... Sequential access has advantages when you access information in the same order all the time. Also is faster than random access.