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file handle Last modified: Tuesday, March 12, 2002

A number that the operating system assigns temporarily to a file when it is opened. The operating system uses the file handle internally when accessing the file. A special area of main memory is reserved for file handles, and the size of this area determines how many files can be open at once. In DOS and Windows, you can set the maximum number of open files with the FILES= statement in CONFIG.SYS.