A method of ensuring that if one process is altering part of the contents of a file, other processes cannot alter that part of the file until the updating activity has been successfully completed. The actual operation of the record-locking mechanism will usually require cooperation between the operating system and the user applications program. Because the lock is applied only to the record(s) that are being updated, the use of record locking allows other processes to operate in other parts of the file, which can be guaranteed not to be affected by the updating process. See also file locking.