from http://developers.sun.com/prodtech/cc/articles/DebugLibraries/DebugLibraries_content.html

elfdump -p core | tail -5
     Program Header[13]:
         p_vaddr:      0xffbf8000      p_flags:    [ PF_X  PF_W  PF_R ]
         p_paddr:      0               p_type:     [ PT_LOAD ]
         p_filesz:     0x8000          p_memsz:    0x8000
         p_offset:     0x71a24         p_align:    0
     % ls -la core
     -rw-------   1 joeuser staff     498212 Jun  4 14:04 core

     # add the <filesz> field and the <offset> field of the
     # last program header segment to find the total expected
     # size of the core file.  See if that number matches
     # the size shown by the ls command.

     % dbx -c "print 0x8000 + 0x71A24 ; quit"
     dbx: warning: unknown language, 'ansic' assumed
     0x8000+0x71a24 = 498212

     # The result matches, so this is a complete core file.