Yep, but it applies to local file as well:
| Property | Description |
|---|---|
| url | Used to specify the URL of an adlist. |
| ssl-verify | Specifies whether to validate the SSL certificate of the Adlist URL server. Will use the /certificate list to verify server validity. |
| match-count | Count of matched DNS name requests. |
| name-count | Count of DNS names imported from the Adlist. |
| file | Used to specify a local file path from which to read adlist data. |
| pause | Temporarily pause the use of all adlist. |
| reload | Checks for updates for all lists, if updates are found, the list is updated, removing or adding entries as needed, the lists are not redownloaded in whole when issuing a reload, instead only necessary updates are done. |
| It's not mandatory to use reload to update the lists, Adlist checks for new updates once every four hours. |
But from the description, the (local) file or URL is checked every 4 hours, and ONLY if there are changes in it (compared to the one previously loaded) the list (in cache/RAM) is updated and actually ONLY the changed items, not the whole file.
So there is no reason why there should be (excessive) writes on disk, it must be a bug of some kind.