The Difference Between Disk Block and File Limits

A file system provides two resources to the user: blocks (for data) and inodes (for files). Each file consumes one inode. File data is stored in data blocks (usually made up of 1 Kbyte blocks).

Assuming there are no directories, a user can exceed his or her inode quota by creating all empty files (without using any blocks). A user can also use one inode yet exceed his or her block quota by simply creating one file large enough to consume all the data blocks in the user's quota.