![Tao Ma](/assets/img/avatar_default.png)
Ted has sent out a RFC about removing this feature. Eric and Jan confirmed that both RedHat and SUSE enable this feature in all their product. David also said that "As far as I know, it's enabled in all Android kernels that use ext4." So it seems OK for us. And what's more, as inline data depends its implementation on xattr, and to be frank, I don't run any test again inline data enabled while xattr disabled. So I think we should add inline data and remove this config option in the same release. [ The savings if you disable CONFIG_EXT4_FS_XATTR is only 27k, which isn't much in the grand scheme of things. Since no one seems to be testing this configuration except for some automated compile farms, on balance we are better removing this config option, and so that it is effectively always enabled. -- tytso ] Cc: David Brown <davidb@codeaurora.org> Cc: Eric Sandeen <sandeen@redhat.com> Reviewed-by: Jan Kara <jack@suse.cz> Signed-off-by: Tao Ma <boyu.mt@taobao.com> Signed-off-by: "Theodore Ts'o" <tytso@mit.edu>
604 lines
26 KiB
Plaintext
604 lines
26 KiB
Plaintext
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Ext4 Filesystem
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===============
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Ext4 is an an advanced level of the ext3 filesystem which incorporates
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scalability and reliability enhancements for supporting large filesystems
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(64 bit) in keeping with increasing disk capacities and state-of-the-art
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feature requirements.
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Mailing list: linux-ext4@vger.kernel.org
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Web site: http://ext4.wiki.kernel.org
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1. Quick usage instructions:
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===========================
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Note: More extensive information for getting started with ext4 can be
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found at the ext4 wiki site at the URL:
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http://ext4.wiki.kernel.org/index.php/Ext4_Howto
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- Compile and install the latest version of e2fsprogs (as of this
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writing version 1.41.3) from:
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http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=2406
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or
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ftp://ftp.kernel.org/pub/linux/kernel/people/tytso/e2fsprogs/
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or grab the latest git repository from:
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git://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/fs/ext2/e2fsprogs.git
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- Note that it is highly important to install the mke2fs.conf file
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that comes with the e2fsprogs 1.41.x sources in /etc/mke2fs.conf. If
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you have edited the /etc/mke2fs.conf file installed on your system,
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you will need to merge your changes with the version from e2fsprogs
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1.41.x.
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- Create a new filesystem using the ext4 filesystem type:
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# mke2fs -t ext4 /dev/hda1
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Or to configure an existing ext3 filesystem to support extents:
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# tune2fs -O extents /dev/hda1
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If the filesystem was created with 128 byte inodes, it can be
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converted to use 256 byte for greater efficiency via:
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# tune2fs -I 256 /dev/hda1
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(Note: we currently do not have tools to convert an ext4
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filesystem back to ext3; so please do not do try this on production
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filesystems.)
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- Mounting:
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# mount -t ext4 /dev/hda1 /wherever
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- When comparing performance with other filesystems, it's always
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important to try multiple workloads; very often a subtle change in a
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workload parameter can completely change the ranking of which
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filesystems do well compared to others. When comparing versus ext3,
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note that ext4 enables write barriers by default, while ext3 does
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not enable write barriers by default. So it is useful to use
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explicitly specify whether barriers are enabled or not when via the
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'-o barriers=[0|1]' mount option for both ext3 and ext4 filesystems
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for a fair comparison. When tuning ext3 for best benchmark numbers,
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it is often worthwhile to try changing the data journaling mode; '-o
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data=writeback' can be faster for some workloads. (Note however that
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running mounted with data=writeback can potentially leave stale data
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exposed in recently written files in case of an unclean shutdown,
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which could be a security exposure in some situations.) Configuring
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the filesystem with a large journal can also be helpful for
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metadata-intensive workloads.
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2. Features
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===========
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2.1 Currently available
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* ability to use filesystems > 16TB (e2fsprogs support not available yet)
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* extent format reduces metadata overhead (RAM, IO for access, transactions)
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* extent format more robust in face of on-disk corruption due to magics,
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* internal redundancy in tree
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* improved file allocation (multi-block alloc)
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* lift 32000 subdirectory limit imposed by i_links_count[1]
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* nsec timestamps for mtime, atime, ctime, create time
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* inode version field on disk (NFSv4, Lustre)
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* reduced e2fsck time via uninit_bg feature
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* journal checksumming for robustness, performance
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* persistent file preallocation (e.g for streaming media, databases)
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* ability to pack bitmaps and inode tables into larger virtual groups via the
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flex_bg feature
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* large file support
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* Inode allocation using large virtual block groups via flex_bg
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* delayed allocation
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* large block (up to pagesize) support
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* efficient new ordered mode in JBD2 and ext4(avoid using buffer head to force
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the ordering)
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[1] Filesystems with a block size of 1k may see a limit imposed by the
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directory hash tree having a maximum depth of two.
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2.2 Candidate features for future inclusion
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* Online defrag (patches available but not well tested)
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* reduced mke2fs time via lazy itable initialization in conjunction with
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the uninit_bg feature (capability to do this is available in e2fsprogs
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but a kernel thread to do lazy zeroing of unused inode table blocks
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after filesystem is first mounted is required for safety)
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There are several others under discussion, whether they all make it in is
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partly a function of how much time everyone has to work on them. Features like
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metadata checksumming have been discussed and planned for a bit but no patches
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exist yet so I'm not sure they're in the near-term roadmap.
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The big performance win will come with mballoc, delalloc and flex_bg
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grouping of bitmaps and inode tables. Some test results available here:
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- http://www.bullopensource.org/ext4/20080818-ffsb/ffsb-write-2.6.27-rc1.html
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- http://www.bullopensource.org/ext4/20080818-ffsb/ffsb-readwrite-2.6.27-rc1.html
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3. Options
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==========
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When mounting an ext4 filesystem, the following option are accepted:
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(*) == default
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ro Mount filesystem read only. Note that ext4 will
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replay the journal (and thus write to the
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partition) even when mounted "read only". The
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mount options "ro,noload" can be used to prevent
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writes to the filesystem.
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journal_checksum Enable checksumming of the journal transactions.
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This will allow the recovery code in e2fsck and the
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kernel to detect corruption in the kernel. It is a
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compatible change and will be ignored by older kernels.
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journal_async_commit Commit block can be written to disk without waiting
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for descriptor blocks. If enabled older kernels cannot
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mount the device. This will enable 'journal_checksum'
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internally.
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journal_dev=devnum When the external journal device's major/minor numbers
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have changed, this option allows the user to specify
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the new journal location. The journal device is
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identified through its new major/minor numbers encoded
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in devnum.
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norecovery Don't load the journal on mounting. Note that
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noload if the filesystem was not unmounted cleanly,
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skipping the journal replay will lead to the
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filesystem containing inconsistencies that can
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lead to any number of problems.
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data=journal All data are committed into the journal prior to being
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written into the main file system. Enabling
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this mode will disable delayed allocation and
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O_DIRECT support.
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data=ordered (*) All data are forced directly out to the main file
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system prior to its metadata being committed to the
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journal.
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data=writeback Data ordering is not preserved, data may be written
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into the main file system after its metadata has been
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committed to the journal.
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commit=nrsec (*) Ext4 can be told to sync all its data and metadata
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every 'nrsec' seconds. The default value is 5 seconds.
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This means that if you lose your power, you will lose
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as much as the latest 5 seconds of work (your
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filesystem will not be damaged though, thanks to the
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journaling). This default value (or any low value)
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will hurt performance, but it's good for data-safety.
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Setting it to 0 will have the same effect as leaving
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it at the default (5 seconds).
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Setting it to very large values will improve
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performance.
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barrier=<0|1(*)> This enables/disables the use of write barriers in
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barrier(*) the jbd code. barrier=0 disables, barrier=1 enables.
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nobarrier This also requires an IO stack which can support
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barriers, and if jbd gets an error on a barrier
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write, it will disable again with a warning.
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Write barriers enforce proper on-disk ordering
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of journal commits, making volatile disk write caches
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safe to use, at some performance penalty. If
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your disks are battery-backed in one way or another,
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disabling barriers may safely improve performance.
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The mount options "barrier" and "nobarrier" can
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also be used to enable or disable barriers, for
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consistency with other ext4 mount options.
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inode_readahead_blks=n This tuning parameter controls the maximum
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number of inode table blocks that ext4's inode
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table readahead algorithm will pre-read into
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the buffer cache. The default value is 32 blocks.
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nouser_xattr Disables Extended User Attributes. See the
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attr(5) manual page and http://acl.bestbits.at/
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for more information about extended attributes.
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noacl This option disables POSIX Access Control List
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support. If ACL support is enabled in the kernel
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configuration (CONFIG_EXT4_FS_POSIX_ACL), ACL is
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enabled by default on mount. See the acl(5) manual
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page and http://acl.bestbits.at/ for more information
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about acl.
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bsddf (*) Make 'df' act like BSD.
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minixdf Make 'df' act like Minix.
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debug Extra debugging information is sent to syslog.
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abort Simulate the effects of calling ext4_abort() for
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debugging purposes. This is normally used while
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remounting a filesystem which is already mounted.
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errors=remount-ro Remount the filesystem read-only on an error.
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errors=continue Keep going on a filesystem error.
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errors=panic Panic and halt the machine if an error occurs.
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(These mount options override the errors behavior
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specified in the superblock, which can be configured
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using tune2fs)
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data_err=ignore(*) Just print an error message if an error occurs
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in a file data buffer in ordered mode.
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data_err=abort Abort the journal if an error occurs in a file
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data buffer in ordered mode.
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grpid Give objects the same group ID as their creator.
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bsdgroups
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nogrpid (*) New objects have the group ID of their creator.
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sysvgroups
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resgid=n The group ID which may use the reserved blocks.
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resuid=n The user ID which may use the reserved blocks.
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sb=n Use alternate superblock at this location.
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quota These options are ignored by the filesystem. They
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noquota are used only by quota tools to recognize volumes
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grpquota where quota should be turned on. See documentation
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usrquota in the quota-tools package for more details
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(http://sourceforge.net/projects/linuxquota).
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jqfmt=<quota type> These options tell filesystem details about quota
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usrjquota=<file> so that quota information can be properly updated
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grpjquota=<file> during journal replay. They replace the above
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quota options. See documentation in the quota-tools
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package for more details
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(http://sourceforge.net/projects/linuxquota).
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stripe=n Number of filesystem blocks that mballoc will try
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to use for allocation size and alignment. For RAID5/6
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systems this should be the number of data
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disks * RAID chunk size in file system blocks.
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delalloc (*) Defer block allocation until just before ext4
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writes out the block(s) in question. This
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allows ext4 to better allocation decisions
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more efficiently.
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nodelalloc Disable delayed allocation. Blocks are allocated
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when the data is copied from userspace to the
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page cache, either via the write(2) system call
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or when an mmap'ed page which was previously
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unallocated is written for the first time.
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max_batch_time=usec Maximum amount of time ext4 should wait for
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additional filesystem operations to be batch
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together with a synchronous write operation.
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Since a synchronous write operation is going to
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force a commit and then a wait for the I/O
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complete, it doesn't cost much, and can be a
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huge throughput win, we wait for a small amount
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of time to see if any other transactions can
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piggyback on the synchronous write. The
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algorithm used is designed to automatically tune
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for the speed of the disk, by measuring the
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amount of time (on average) that it takes to
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finish committing a transaction. Call this time
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the "commit time". If the time that the
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transaction has been running is less than the
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commit time, ext4 will try sleeping for the
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commit time to see if other operations will join
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the transaction. The commit time is capped by
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the max_batch_time, which defaults to 15000us
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(15ms). This optimization can be turned off
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entirely by setting max_batch_time to 0.
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min_batch_time=usec This parameter sets the commit time (as
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described above) to be at least min_batch_time.
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It defaults to zero microseconds. Increasing
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this parameter may improve the throughput of
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multi-threaded, synchronous workloads on very
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fast disks, at the cost of increasing latency.
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journal_ioprio=prio The I/O priority (from 0 to 7, where 0 is the
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highest priority) which should be used for I/O
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operations submitted by kjournald2 during a
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commit operation. This defaults to 3, which is
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a slightly higher priority than the default I/O
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priority.
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auto_da_alloc(*) Many broken applications don't use fsync() when
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noauto_da_alloc replacing existing files via patterns such as
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fd = open("foo.new")/write(fd,..)/close(fd)/
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rename("foo.new", "foo"), or worse yet,
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fd = open("foo", O_TRUNC)/write(fd,..)/close(fd).
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If auto_da_alloc is enabled, ext4 will detect
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the replace-via-rename and replace-via-truncate
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patterns and force that any delayed allocation
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blocks are allocated such that at the next
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journal commit, in the default data=ordered
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mode, the data blocks of the new file are forced
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to disk before the rename() operation is
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committed. This provides roughly the same level
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of guarantees as ext3, and avoids the
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"zero-length" problem that can happen when a
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system crashes before the delayed allocation
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blocks are forced to disk.
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noinit_itable Do not initialize any uninitialized inode table
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blocks in the background. This feature may be
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used by installation CD's so that the install
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process can complete as quickly as possible; the
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inode table initialization process would then be
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deferred until the next time the file system
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is unmounted.
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init_itable=n The lazy itable init code will wait n times the
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number of milliseconds it took to zero out the
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previous block group's inode table. This
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minimizes the impact on the system performance
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while file system's inode table is being initialized.
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discard Controls whether ext4 should issue discard/TRIM
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nodiscard(*) commands to the underlying block device when
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blocks are freed. This is useful for SSD devices
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and sparse/thinly-provisioned LUNs, but it is off
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by default until sufficient testing has been done.
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nouid32 Disables 32-bit UIDs and GIDs. This is for
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interoperability with older kernels which only
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store and expect 16-bit values.
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block_validity This options allows to enables/disables the in-kernel
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noblock_validity facility for tracking filesystem metadata blocks
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within internal data structures. This allows multi-
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block allocator and other routines to quickly locate
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extents which might overlap with filesystem metadata
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blocks. This option is intended for debugging
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purposes and since it negatively affects the
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performance, it is off by default.
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dioread_lock Controls whether or not ext4 should use the DIO read
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dioread_nolock locking. If the dioread_nolock option is specified
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ext4 will allocate uninitialized extent before buffer
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write and convert the extent to initialized after IO
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completes. This approach allows ext4 code to avoid
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using inode mutex, which improves scalability on high
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speed storages. However this does not work with
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data journaling and dioread_nolock option will be
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ignored with kernel warning. Note that dioread_nolock
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code path is only used for extent-based files.
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Because of the restrictions this options comprises
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it is off by default (e.g. dioread_lock).
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max_dir_size_kb=n This limits the size of directories so that any
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attempt to expand them beyond the specified
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limit in kilobytes will cause an ENOSPC error.
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This is useful in memory constrained
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environments, where a very large directory can
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cause severe performance problems or even
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provoke the Out Of Memory killer. (For example,
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if there is only 512mb memory available, a 176mb
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directory may seriously cramp the system's style.)
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i_version Enable 64-bit inode version support. This option is
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off by default.
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Data Mode
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=========
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There are 3 different data modes:
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* writeback mode
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In data=writeback mode, ext4 does not journal data at all. This mode provides
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a similar level of journaling as that of XFS, JFS, and ReiserFS in its default
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mode - metadata journaling. A crash+recovery can cause incorrect data to
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appear in files which were written shortly before the crash. This mode will
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typically provide the best ext4 performance.
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* ordered mode
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In data=ordered mode, ext4 only officially journals metadata, but it logically
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groups metadata information related to data changes with the data blocks into a
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single unit called a transaction. When it's time to write the new metadata
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out to disk, the associated data blocks are written first. In general,
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this mode performs slightly slower than writeback but significantly faster than journal mode.
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* journal mode
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data=journal mode provides full data and metadata journaling. All new data is
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written to the journal first, and then to its final location.
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In the event of a crash, the journal can be replayed, bringing both data and
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metadata into a consistent state. This mode is the slowest except when data
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needs to be read from and written to disk at the same time where it
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outperforms all others modes. Enabling this mode will disable delayed
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allocation and O_DIRECT support.
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/proc entries
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=============
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Information about mounted ext4 file systems can be found in
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/proc/fs/ext4. Each mounted filesystem will have a directory in
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/proc/fs/ext4 based on its device name (i.e., /proc/fs/ext4/hdc or
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/proc/fs/ext4/dm-0). The files in each per-device directory are shown
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in table below.
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Files in /proc/fs/ext4/<devname>
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..............................................................................
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File Content
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mb_groups details of multiblock allocator buddy cache of free blocks
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..............................................................................
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/sys entries
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============
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Information about mounted ext4 file systems can be found in
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/sys/fs/ext4. Each mounted filesystem will have a directory in
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/sys/fs/ext4 based on its device name (i.e., /sys/fs/ext4/hdc or
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/sys/fs/ext4/dm-0). The files in each per-device directory are shown
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in table below.
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Files in /sys/fs/ext4/<devname>
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(see also Documentation/ABI/testing/sysfs-fs-ext4)
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..............................................................................
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File Content
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delayed_allocation_blocks This file is read-only and shows the number of
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blocks that are dirty in the page cache, but
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which do not have their location in the
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filesystem allocated yet.
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inode_goal Tuning parameter which (if non-zero) controls
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the goal inode used by the inode allocator in
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preference to all other allocation heuristics.
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This is intended for debugging use only, and
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should be 0 on production systems.
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inode_readahead_blks Tuning parameter which controls the maximum
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number of inode table blocks that ext4's inode
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table readahead algorithm will pre-read into
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the buffer cache
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lifetime_write_kbytes This file is read-only and shows the number of
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kilobytes of data that have been written to this
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filesystem since it was created.
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max_writeback_mb_bump The maximum number of megabytes the writeback
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code will try to write out before move on to
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another inode.
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mb_group_prealloc The multiblock allocator will round up allocation
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|
requests to a multiple of this tuning parameter if
|
|
the stripe size is not set in the ext4 superblock
|
|
|
|
mb_max_to_scan The maximum number of extents the multiblock
|
|
allocator will search to find the best extent
|
|
|
|
mb_min_to_scan The minimum number of extents the multiblock
|
|
allocator will search to find the best extent
|
|
|
|
mb_order2_req Tuning parameter which controls the minimum size
|
|
for requests (as a power of 2) where the buddy
|
|
cache is used
|
|
|
|
mb_stats Controls whether the multiblock allocator should
|
|
collect statistics, which are shown during the
|
|
unmount. 1 means to collect statistics, 0 means
|
|
not to collect statistics
|
|
|
|
mb_stream_req Files which have fewer blocks than this tunable
|
|
parameter will have their blocks allocated out
|
|
of a block group specific preallocation pool, so
|
|
that small files are packed closely together.
|
|
Each large file will have its blocks allocated
|
|
out of its own unique preallocation pool.
|
|
|
|
session_write_kbytes This file is read-only and shows the number of
|
|
kilobytes of data that have been written to this
|
|
filesystem since it was mounted.
|
|
..............................................................................
|
|
|
|
Ioctls
|
|
======
|
|
|
|
There is some Ext4 specific functionality which can be accessed by applications
|
|
through the system call interfaces. The list of all Ext4 specific ioctls are
|
|
shown in the table below.
|
|
|
|
Table of Ext4 specific ioctls
|
|
..............................................................................
|
|
Ioctl Description
|
|
EXT4_IOC_GETFLAGS Get additional attributes associated with inode.
|
|
The ioctl argument is an integer bitfield, with
|
|
bit values described in ext4.h. This ioctl is an
|
|
alias for FS_IOC_GETFLAGS.
|
|
|
|
EXT4_IOC_SETFLAGS Set additional attributes associated with inode.
|
|
The ioctl argument is an integer bitfield, with
|
|
bit values described in ext4.h. This ioctl is an
|
|
alias for FS_IOC_SETFLAGS.
|
|
|
|
EXT4_IOC_GETVERSION
|
|
EXT4_IOC_GETVERSION_OLD
|
|
Get the inode i_generation number stored for
|
|
each inode. The i_generation number is normally
|
|
changed only when new inode is created and it is
|
|
particularly useful for network filesystems. The
|
|
'_OLD' version of this ioctl is an alias for
|
|
FS_IOC_GETVERSION.
|
|
|
|
EXT4_IOC_SETVERSION
|
|
EXT4_IOC_SETVERSION_OLD
|
|
Set the inode i_generation number stored for
|
|
each inode. The '_OLD' version of this ioctl
|
|
is an alias for FS_IOC_SETVERSION.
|
|
|
|
EXT4_IOC_GROUP_EXTEND This ioctl has the same purpose as the resize
|
|
mount option. It allows to resize filesystem
|
|
to the end of the last existing block group,
|
|
further resize has to be done with resize2fs,
|
|
either online, or offline. The argument points
|
|
to the unsigned logn number representing the
|
|
filesystem new block count.
|
|
|
|
EXT4_IOC_MOVE_EXT Move the block extents from orig_fd (the one
|
|
this ioctl is pointing to) to the donor_fd (the
|
|
one specified in move_extent structure passed
|
|
as an argument to this ioctl). Then, exchange
|
|
inode metadata between orig_fd and donor_fd.
|
|
This is especially useful for online
|
|
defragmentation, because the allocator has the
|
|
opportunity to allocate moved blocks better,
|
|
ideally into one contiguous extent.
|
|
|
|
EXT4_IOC_GROUP_ADD Add a new group descriptor to an existing or
|
|
new group descriptor block. The new group
|
|
descriptor is described by ext4_new_group_input
|
|
structure, which is passed as an argument to
|
|
this ioctl. This is especially useful in
|
|
conjunction with EXT4_IOC_GROUP_EXTEND,
|
|
which allows online resize of the filesystem
|
|
to the end of the last existing block group.
|
|
Those two ioctls combined is used in userspace
|
|
online resize tool (e.g. resize2fs).
|
|
|
|
EXT4_IOC_MIGRATE This ioctl operates on the filesystem itself.
|
|
It converts (migrates) ext3 indirect block mapped
|
|
inode to ext4 extent mapped inode by walking
|
|
through indirect block mapping of the original
|
|
inode and converting contiguous block ranges
|
|
into ext4 extents of the temporary inode. Then,
|
|
inodes are swapped. This ioctl might help, when
|
|
migrating from ext3 to ext4 filesystem, however
|
|
suggestion is to create fresh ext4 filesystem
|
|
and copy data from the backup. Note, that
|
|
filesystem has to support extents for this ioctl
|
|
to work.
|
|
|
|
EXT4_IOC_ALLOC_DA_BLKS Force all of the delay allocated blocks to be
|
|
allocated to preserve application-expected ext3
|
|
behaviour. Note that this will also start
|
|
triggering a write of the data blocks, but this
|
|
behaviour may change in the future as it is
|
|
not necessary and has been done this way only
|
|
for sake of simplicity.
|
|
|
|
EXT4_IOC_RESIZE_FS Resize the filesystem to a new size. The number
|
|
of blocks of resized filesystem is passed in via
|
|
64 bit integer argument. The kernel allocates
|
|
bitmaps and inode table, the userspace tool thus
|
|
just passes the new number of blocks.
|
|
|
|
..............................................................................
|
|
|
|
References
|
|
==========
|
|
|
|
kernel source: <file:fs/ext4/>
|
|
<file:fs/jbd2/>
|
|
|
|
programs: http://e2fsprogs.sourceforge.net/
|
|
|
|
useful links: http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/ext3-devel
|
|
http://www.bullopensource.org/ext4/
|
|
http://ext4.wiki.kernel.org/index.php/Main_Page
|
|
http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Features/Ext4
|