Filesystem recommendations
in [Debian]
|
Prev: overcoming the 32k objects limit is ext3 - which file system to use?
Next: Why is Acroversion not properly updated?
From: Boyd Stephen Smith Jr. on 26 Apr 2010 14:20 On Saturday 24 April 2010 12:53:25 B. Alexander wrote: > I have a question on filesystems. Back in the day, I started using reiser3. > It was faster than ext3, and it could be extended without umounting the > filesystem (which has since been fixed in ext3), plus, unlike any > filesystem I have encountered, it could be reduced in size. I'm also a current reiser3 user. I find the ability to shrink the filesystem to be something I am not willing to do without. I have not read the rest of the thread, but my off-the-cuff recommendation would be to start migration to btrfs. Now that the on-disk format has stabilized, I am going to start testing it for filesystems other than /usr/local, /var, and /home. Assuming I can keep those running well for 6-12 months, I will migrate /usr/local, /var, and then /home, in that order, with a 1-3 month gap in between migrations. It's an aggressive migration plan, but reiser3 is just barely maintained in the kernel, and btrfs is the only filesystem I have heard of that even advertises all the features I need. I've already encountered an issue related to btrfs in my very isolated deployments. The initramfs created by update-initramfs does not appear to mount it properly. Instead I am given an '(initramfs)' prompt and I have to mount the filesystem manually (a simple two-argument mount command suffices) and continue the boot process. This is fine for my laptop, but servers (and even my desktop) need to be able to boot unattended; I am still investigating the issue, which may just be due to my configuration. -- Boyd Stephen Smith Jr. ,= ,-_-. =. bss(a)iguanasuicide.net ((_/)o o(\_)) ICQ: 514984 YM/AIM: DaTwinkDaddy `-'(. .)`-' http://iguanasuicide.net/ \_/
From: Boyd Stephen Smith Jr. on 26 Apr 2010 14:30 On Monday 26 April 2010 13:22:19 Boyd Stephen Smith Jr. wrote: > On Saturday 24 April 2010 12:53:25 B. Alexander wrote: > > I have a question on filesystems. > > [M]y off-the-cuff recommendation > would be to start migration to btrfs. Btrfs may not be right for you. The on-disk format has stabilized, but it is still very much in development. If it isn't, I recommend moving to ext3 (NOT ext4) as a temporary measure. Once btrfs matures to your comfort level, you can use btrfs_convert to change from ext3 to btrfs in place. The conversion process even creates a snapshot which can use used to roll back to the original ext3 filesystem. -- Boyd Stephen Smith Jr. ,= ,-_-. =. bss(a)iguanasuicide.net ((_/)o o(\_)) ICQ: 514984 YM/AIM: DaTwinkDaddy `-'(. .)`-' http://iguanasuicide.net/ \_/
From: thib on 26 Apr 2010 15:10 Boyd Stephen Smith Jr. wrote: > [snip] I recommend moving to ext3 (NOT ext4) [snip] Here we go again? :-) -thib -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-user-REQUEST(a)lists.debian.org with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact listmaster(a)lists.debian.org Archive: http://lists.debian.org/4BD5E416.7050408(a)stammed.net
From: B. Alexander on 26 Apr 2010 17:10 On Mon, Apr 26, 2010 at 2:22 PM, Boyd Stephen Smith Jr. < bss(a)iguanasuicide.net> wrote: > I'm also a current reiser3 user. I find the ability to shrink the > filesystem > to be something I am not willing to do without. > You know, I said the same thing, but then as the kernel and GRUB and the like advanced, I noticed that my reiserfs partitions would have to replay the journal every time I rebooted, even after a clean shutdown. I started calculating how many times I shrunk any of my partitions in the last 8 years, and I can only recall twice. And since I have several terabytes around the house, I figure I can migrate data and delete/recreate partitions if I really need to reduce it. > I have not read the rest of the thread, but my off-the-cuff recommendation > would be to start migration to btrfs. Now that the on-disk format has > stabilized, I am going to start testing it for filesystems other than > /usr/local, /var, and /home. Assuming I can keep those running well for > 6-12 > months, I will migrate /usr/local, /var, and then /home, in that order, > with a > 1-3 month gap in between migrations. > I might play with it for some non-critical partitions, or ones that I can mirror on an established filesystem, even if it is only to use in an "Archive Island" scenario, where I have a LV that I can mount, sync and umount. However, btrfs is not included in the kernel, is it? As I recall, nilfs2 has kernel support, but that was the only one of the new filesystems, at the time when I started looking at this. > It's an aggressive migration plan, but reiser3 is just barely maintained in > the kernel, and btrfs is the only filesystem I have heard of that even > advertises all the features I need. > > I've already encountered an issue related to btrfs in my very isolated > deployments. The initramfs created by update-initramfs does not appear to > mount it properly. Instead I am given an '(initramfs)' prompt and I have > to > mount the filesystem manually (a simple two-argument mount command > suffices) > and continue the boot process. This is fine for my laptop, but servers > (and > even my desktop) need to be able to boot unattended; I am still > investigating > the issue, which may just be due to my configuration. > That is enough to give me pause... --b
From: Boyd Stephen Smith Jr. on 26 Apr 2010 17:40
On Monday 26 April 2010 16:05:31 B. Alexander wrote: > On Mon, Apr 26, 2010 at 2:22 PM, Boyd Stephen Smith Jr. < > bss(a)iguanasuicide.net> wrote: > > I'm also a current reiser3 user. I find the ability to shrink the > > filesystem > > to be something I am not willing to do without. > > You know, I said the same thing, but then as the kernel and GRUB and the > like advanced, I noticed that my reiserfs partitions would have to replay > the journal every time I rebooted, even after a clean shutdown. I started > calculating how many times I shrunk any of my partitions in the last 8 > years, and I can only recall twice. And since I have several terabytes > around the house, I figure I can migrate data and delete/recreate > partitions if I really need to reduce it. That doesn't seem right. I have been using reiser3 since 2005, and my system does not require a journal replay if I do a clean shutdown/reboot. A forced reboot through Alt+SysRq+B does trigger a journal replay (as it should). I also have 4+ tebibytes but most of them are allocated to filesystems. I've had to shrink filesystems dozens of times since 2005, during or after a data move. I don't use partitions (much), having been using LVM happily for everything except /boot. I'm hoping to be able to move that onto LVM once I move to GRUB2 and GPT. > > I have not read the rest of the thread, but my off-the-cuff > > recommendation would be to start migration to btrfs. Now that the > > on-disk format has stabilized, I am going to start testing it for > > filesystems other than /usr/local, /var, and /home. Assuming I can keep > > those running well for 6-12 > > months, I will migrate /usr/local, /var, and then /home, in that order, > > with a > > 1-3 month gap in between migrations. > > I might play with it for some non-critical partitions, or ones that I can > mirror on an established filesystem, even if it is only to use in an > "Archive Island" scenario, where I have a LV that I can mount, sync and > umount. However, btrfs is not included in the kernel, is it? As I recall, > nilfs2 has kernel support, but that was the only one of the new > filesystems, at the time when I started looking at this. btrfs is included in 2.6.31.12-0.2-default in openSUSE 11.2. It is also included in linux-image-2.6-686 and linux-image-2.6-amd64 for lenny-backports, testing, and sid. I don't normally deal with other architectures/distributions, so it might also be available there. > > I've already encountered an issue related to btrfs in my very isolated > > deployments. The initramfs created by update-initramfs does not appear > > to mount it properly. Instead I am given an '(initramfs)' prompt and I > > have to > > mount the filesystem manually (a simple two-argument mount command > > suffices) > > and continue the boot process. This is fine for my laptop, but servers > > (and > > even my desktop) need to be able to boot unattended; I am still > > investigating > > the issue, which may just be due to my configuration. > > That is enough to give me pause... It doesn't appear to be a file system issue, but rather a problem with the initramfs scripts. It could also be rooted in my configuration. I know that my "root=" kernel parameter has to differ from the device name in my /etc/fstab in order to get the initramfs to correctly initialize LVM. I don't mind being a first adopter for this in particular; I hope to be able to report good things about btrfs by this time next year. -- Boyd Stephen Smith Jr. ,= ,-_-. =. bss(a)iguanasuicide.net ((_/)o o(\_)) ICQ: 514984 YM/AIM: DaTwinkDaddy `-'(. .)`-' http://iguanasuicide.net/ \_/ |