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Tom's Hardware Looks At WinFS
Posted by
timothy
on Tue Jun 17, 2003 11:35 PM
from the straight-to-the-nsa dept.
from the straight-to-the-nsa dept.
Alizarin Erythrosin writes "Tom's Hardware Guide has an article about the new WinFS file system. The article talks first about some of the problems and advantages with FAT[16|32] and NTFS, then talks briefly about WinFS. Here is the summary: 'Microsoft is breaking new ground with Longhorn, successor to XP. The upcoming WinFS file system will be the first to be context-dependent, and promises to make long search times and wasted memory a thing of the past. Today, THG compares it to FAT and NTFS.' Personally, I still have reservations about using a relational database to keep track of files. Unless they can keep the overhead to a minimum, I can't see it being as efficient as a file system should be."
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db filesystem (Score:5, Interesting)
BeOS used indexing for certain attributes, and it is GREAT. Maybe someone is just sour that linux didn't do it first?
Re:db filesystem (Score:5, Interesting)
I gathered that the quote was alluding to the fact that while the BFS did initially use a full relational database backend, it performed very poorly. Be replaced the backend with a more conventional one, but kept the SQL-like interface to it. It increased performance, but just wasn't quite as cool anymore. Maybe now that PCs have increased in power by several magnitudes since Be last tried this, Microsoft may actually be able to pull it off.
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Re:db filesystem (Score:5, Insightful)
a) I want to store that it's a jpg file. I am Japanese and see no reason why the file type should be indicated by a small dot shape followed by three symbols left over from the roman empire that stand for some words in a language I don't speak. File name extensions are very archaic technology.
b) I want to record when I took the photograph that this picture represents.
c) I want to record that this photograph is going in my family album
d) I want to record that this is an 'outdoor' photograph
e) I want to record that this photograph is of Mount Fuji
f) I want to record that this particular file is the high-resolution version, suitable for output onto my photo-printer.
g) get the point? I could have a lots of symlinks of this file to folders called 'my photos' and 'outdoor photos' and 'photos taken in July' but that would be a stupid ugly hack. I could call my file:
mount_fuji_july-hi_res-outdoor.jpg
but that would be even more stupid.
Now, at this point someone says "well, if you want all that then just buy a content-management application that sits ontop of the OS and lets you catalog all your stuff."
I think MS has realised that pretty much every file _should_ be in a content management system of some kind. They are simply adding a lightweight CMS to the OS, which seems perfectly sensible to me. That way, other applications can make use of the meta-data the CMS holds. The file open dialogue on all windows apps will, instead of a directory browser have the ability to query the CMS for, say 'most recent versions of my hi res outdoor photos' which seems good to me.
I never fail to be baffled at the degree of inertia in the IT world. I sometimes thing every computer person thinks technology should be frozen at whatever point they got tired of learning new stuff. "File name extensions and symbolic links were good enough for me lad!" It's a weird attitude.
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SCO (Score:5, Funny)
I'll reserve judgement (Score:5, Insightful)
In any event, Microsoft still has a few years to refine this "Future Storage" file system, so all judgements concerning it's effectiveness are a bit premature on some levels. Then again, it's always good to start planning as early as possible - especially when you consider that it may be introduced into Windows Server 2003 some time during the next 12-18 months. For now, all we can base judegement off of is Microsoft marketing hype and comparisons to existing file systems that operate in a similar way.
Re:I'll reserve judgement (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:I'll reserve judgement (Score:5, Informative)
What WinFS adds is more powerful indexing, not a new storage system. Whenever you add or modify a file, WinFS adds the file's attributes to its indexes. The attributes stored are customizable, and vary depending on file type (MP3s have their ID3 info indexed, etc.). For example: somerwhere on my 120 GB disk I have a file named "code.txt" but it will take 10 minutes to find it by scanning the directory structure. Instead, I do a "SELECT Path FROM Files WHERE Filename='code.txt'" and WinFS comes up with the answer right away. If I have full text indexing, I could search for a specific phrase. Even more useful, you don't have to make playlists anymore. Just put all of your MP3s in the same directory, and when you want to hear all of your Bon Jovi, just perform the appropriate query. (Obviously you don't have to know SQL to make this useful.)
Some of this is already present in a more limited form in Unix. For example, I still can't figure out why Windows doesn't have something like the LOCATE database that is set up by default on my FreeBSD box. But WinFS will blow LOCATE away (update is real time, not daily, and it has much more than just the file name).
However, from what I've heard, so far it is a bit of a dog performance-wise. I hope it gets up to speed by ship time... At least it can be turned off if you can't take the perf hit.
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Re:I'll reserve judgement (Score:5, Interesting)
First, the async, means that not all reads and writes are syncronous which is an incredibly good thing for speed. Try putting your UFS/FFS filesystem into fully sync mode and then talk about performance, I'm willing to bet that UFS/FFS isn't sync by default either. However, calling fsync in the mail server (normally sendmail) in Linux will actually make it sync before returning. So no worries about RFC 1123. It's the SMTP server's job to ensure that it tells the filesystem, make sure the bits are on the disk. If Linux didn't have the ability to ensure bits where actually on the disk nobody would use it. That's why in Moshe Bar's series comparing Linux, FreeBSD, and OS X, he always said he recompiled after removing the fsync calls, otherwise you just compared how fast the disks in each system were.
For goodness sakes, Oracle ships on Linux, if Linux couldn't get the bits on the disk Oracle would have never ported to it. Not a chance. If Linux tells you the bits are on the disk, they are on the disk in my experience.
I've heard of people losing UFS filesystems while running them under NFS, or losing them due to any number of naferious VM race conditions. So what? Welcome to the real world, people lose data, buy a tape drive, make backups. Knew a guy who got really good at rebuilding filesystems by using dd on Solaris to recover email for customers.
Oh, and as I recall, async actually affects directories more then files, if you put the sync modifier on the filesystem, it only affects directories, not the file data for ext2/3. In ext3, directory writes are always journaled as I recall, so it shouldn't make much difference.
Now, from what I've heard of Linux and FreeBSD, is that until the late 2.2.X and early 2.4.X, there we're certain jobs Linux couldn't do like run big Usenet News services, or really disk intensive applications they the filesystem buffering was really hard to get right, and might cause corruption. The guy who ran a local ISP always said FreeBSD never did that when he was running the Usenet server on it, but Linux did with some regularity.
ext2 hasn't lot any data of mine in my 7 years of using Linux, including running a 120GB Oracle Database for the past 30 months. Ext3's never lost any data since I started using it. I've lost disk drives, I've lost mirrors, I've lost files, never lost a complete ext2 filesystem unless the disk just stopped spinning. Lost a couple of ReiserFS filesystems after installing RedHat7.0. Never tried most of the other journalling filesystems.
Kirby
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Re:I'll reserve judgement (Score:5, Informative)
Plenty of filesystems are out there that do ACLs. FreeBSD's UFS2 does, I'm pretty sure SGI's XFS and IBM's JFS do also.
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This article is bullshit (Score:5, Troll)
Re:This article is bullshit (Score:5, Insightful)
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Be proud mate. (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:This article is bullshit (Score:5, Insightful)
Tom's Hardware must have degenerated while I wasn't looking. The articles used to be full of detail, two printed pages long per "digital article page" (what you see on the screen
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Re:This article is bullshit (Score:5, Interesting)
It's really funny how they try to compare it with a file system, since they're just looking at NTFS with a layer giving the user an easier time to do certain things.
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Re:This article is bullshit (Score:5, Informative)
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Re:This article is bullshit (Score:5, Funny)
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WinFS is on top of NTFS (Score:5, Interesting)
This was actually confirmed at WinHEC:
"Microsoft has scaled back its 'Big Bang', and its Future Storage initiative will build on, rather than supersede the NTFS file system, when the next version of Windows 'Longhorn' appears in 2005."
"WinFS is not a file system
NTFS will be the only supported file system in Longhorn, from a setup and deployment standpoint, though the OS will, of course, continue to support legacy file systems like FAT and FAT32 for dual-boot and upgrade purposes. The oft-misunderstood Windows Future Storage (WinFS), which will include technology from the "Yukon" release of SQL Server, is not a file system, Mark Myers told me. Instead, WinFS is a service that runs on top of--and requires--NTFS. "WinFS sits on top of NTFS," he said. "It sits on top of the file system. NTFS will be a requirement."
Interestingly, when WinFS is enabled, file letters are hidden from the end user, though they're still lurking there under the covers for compatibility with legacy applications. This reminds of when Microsoft added long file name (LFN) support in Windows 95, but kept using short (8.3) file names under the covers so 16-bit applications would still work. Expect this to be the first step toward the wholesale elimination of drive letters in a future Windows version."
Terrible article (Score:5, Informative)
The closest it gets to examining the (possible!) new Windows filesystem is calling it a relational database, and going on for a bit about how paths (ie: directory structures) will be irrelevant. Oh, and yeah, the closest thing he found to the implementation was called "winfs.exe" and did nothing but produce errors.
The bulk of the article is a (poor) attempt at explaining filesystems in general, and FAT and NTFS in particular. However, it gets a number of things wrong and - at best - garbles a lot of things. If you already know what he's trying to say, you *may* be able to pick out truths, but if you don't you'll walk away with misinformation.
I would suggest instead perusing arstechnica.com and aceshardware.com. I don't know if they've done any filesystem stuff, but if they have it'll be of reasonable quality.
Oh so informative! (Score:5, Interesting)
"There has been much speculation"
Uh huh.
"Win FS is modeled on the file system of the coming SQL server"
Uh huh.
"In its latest build (M4), Longhorn contains few hints of the technology's imminent implementation."
Uh huh. You're saying you don't know anything, yeah, I'm getting that part.
"One of those is more than 20 MB in size and bears the name winfs.exe."
Neat.
"In the end, Win FS will probably emerge as an optional file system beside FAT and NTFS. It's also possible that Win FS will supersede its predecessors, however."
So in the end, it'll be A... but it is also possible it'll be B. I see.
"That would most likely produce problems for multi-boot systems"
An astounding feat of logic Mr. Spock!
This is the most uninformative article I've ever had the displeasure of reading on Tom's Hardware. These people know exactly nothing more about WinFS than any of the rest of us have heard in rumors and vague press releases.
My turn (Score:5, Insightful)
Looks like I was wrong - or, actually, right all along. Musta been a slow news day?
I'd be happy if they just let me use write caching (Score:5, Informative)
See http://forums.storagereview.net/index.php?act=ST&
For such an in-depth article... (Score:5, Informative)
1) NT4 (certainly from SP3) allows you to make partition alterations without a reboot. Even 2K requires a reboot for alterations to the boot partition, however.
2) 2K doesn't dispense with the drive letter concept, despite the implication in the article that this is the case. That you can mount partitions under folders doesn't change this.
3) You can specify the cluster size when formatting a drive under NT4.
Also, has anyone actually come across a data centre that is making use of multi-hundred-TB NTFS volumes?
And, will Longhorn finally do away with the whole drive letter concept?
Better, not best (Score:5, Interesting)
However, the best solution is that used by EROS [eros-os.org], which is for the kernel not to provide a file system at all, but instead provide Orthogonal Persistence.
This is a much simpler layer for applications, since it doesn't require them to explicitly access the memory and disk separately. It is also much simpler to recover from because the entire state of the whole disk is always known to be coherent with itself at all given points in time, without an expensive journal.
In terms of performance - it beats the hell out of explicit disk access systems (Both conventional and database systems) because it performs big continuous reads and writes (that don't move the head much) rather than small writes on metadata and file data that forcibly jump the disk head around.
In EROS then, on top of the Orthogonal Persistence, you can create any arbitrary Objects you want easily - because they're just normal processes with normal memory. Conventional File Systems become useless and objects implemented by processes become a much better and more powerful alternative to files.
A relational database of the user objects is then much more powerful than a string hierarchy, but this is all the user's choice - and not hardcoded into a kernel.
Re:Better, not best (Score:5, Insightful)
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Truth be told... (Score:5, Interesting)
A filesystem based on a relational database will have some characteristics to which today's filesystems can only aspire:
1. ACID - In every way that the underlying database supports Atomicity, Consistency, Isolation, and Durability [techtarget.com], so now will the filesystem. In so far as the database is robust, the filesystem will be robust. Please spare me the comments about the supposed unreliability of SQL Server. Itâ(TM)s certainly more reliable than NTFS; which is itself very good.
2. As an offshoot of the above - Imagine multiple file updates to a filesystem which is transactional! Imagine that transaction failing and being able to just rollback the changes without touching every file in your program! Imagine being able to make file changes programmatically without having to worry about locking because the engine will do it for you (just handle any exceptions)! Yeah, you could do all that today if you like. But it takes extensive to make it happen.
3. Operational characteristics - We can run queries against databases. We can index them. We can cluster them. We can replicate them. We can access them easily from any development platform you can imagine. Now your filesystem is a database. The possibilities make me shiver!
4. Another offshoot from #3 - Security. Databases are inherently better than filesystems (IMNSHO) at enforcing security and enabling administration of security.
I only have reservations about one issue with the database as filesystem area: recovery. Currently, all good and low-tech filesystem recovery tools really are based on the filesystem allocation table sort of scheme. Obviously, databases usurp this category of tried and true tools. However, good tools already do exist that allow recovery of relational databases. Itâ(TM)s just a matter of getting easily accessible tools of this sort into the hands of professionals that need them. It's more of a training issue I guess, but it will still need addressing.
I know many people will have a knee jerk reaction to this idea, and I understand why. But I would encourage people to keep an open mind to this. While there will probably be some issues with the idea, there's so much more that could easily be done with a filesystem on top of a database than could be done easily (or well) with a traditional filesystem.
And for you hard-core naysayers out there, you have to ask yourself this: If this is such a bad idea, then why did Oracle provide this as a feature too? [oracle.com]
We beta test an atomic filesystem next month (Score:5, Informative)
and at www.namesys.com/v4/v4.html.
We will be adding support for semi-structured data querying in the next major release, assuming that we find funding for it. The semantics for it are described at www.namesys.com/whitepaper.html, which also explains why I don't think the relational model is effective for semi-structured data stores such as a general purpose filesystem is normally used for.
Best,
Hans
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Good idea, bad implementation (Score:5, Interesting)
A directory tree is a very useful structure, at least to the software. Similar stuff is grouped together, and easily cached. It provides a very clean and simple way of putting data somewhere and getting it back later. This should not lightly cast aside.
So, you want to use a relational database to keep track of files? Go for it, but instead of keeping track of the files themselves, keep track of their paths. Let the filesystem do the efficient storage, and the database do the efficient lookups. The database can be made faster and smaller, the filesystems can remain as fast as they are, and the files are still there even if the database gets corrupted.
Put hooks wherever necessary to update the database when the filesystem changes. For example, put a database in the root of each filesystem. Use a stacked mount to mount that disk, so when interesting things happen, the kernel tells a userspace process that updates the database. Then, make some standard libraries that use the database. Make file browsers that can query it, but pass the path to programs. Make save dialogs that can also save metadata about the file, and open dialogs that can search for it. Use LUFS or FUSE to make directories that correspond to queries.
This is just as effective as what MS is doing [theregister.co.uk], but it's more efficient, it's more compatible, and it doesn't reinvent the wheel.
RTFA, /. !!! (Score:5, Insightful)
Right on the first page of the article, the "journalist" who wrote it describes disk storage as "memory". In the "Summary" of the article posted on every page, current file systems are described as wasting "memory". This reminds me of every-day users who confuse their computer running slowly (or literally telling them they don't have enough memory) with the need to delete files from the hard drive -- two completely separate things in most situations. This is all aside from the fact that the article doesn't actually tell you much that anybody who's used computers for more than six months doesn't already know. This guy sounds like some of the kids who come to me interviewing for I.T. positions thinking they've got a leg-up on everyone else because they've got some basic experience with PC's and Windows.
The bottom line is that the guy who wrote this article doesn't have any business writing tech articles without heavy supervision from someone who KNOWS tech, and I don't just mean someone who knows enough to rattle off performance numbers for CPU comparisons (read some other articles on the site). Lastly, Slashdot has no business posting amateurish and misinforming articles like this for the rest of us to waste our time on.
WinFS was originally a desktop usability thing (Score:5, Insightful)
Usability engineers looked at what users were doing in Windows and they saw that tons of people weren't using the filesystem - at least not directly. They were just putting everything on the desktop. If it was on the desktop, they could find it. They kept folder structures to a minimum and organized things visually (or not at all).
This posed a significant problem, so indexing and searching and abstracting the filesystem was one of the solutions. Instead of having to navigate a filesystem (hard for many users), you just type in what you're looking for and *poof* it appears. Not sure what you're looking for? Start describing it... *poof* it appears.
I'm not saying this is the right solution, but technology is not always about cluster size and performance - especially if the system isn't usable. It will be interesting to see how user friendly this WinFS thing is...
Microsoft Marketing 101 (Score:5, Funny)
2 years before release: Product will do everything for the majority of users.
1 year before release: Product will do many things for many users.
Release: Well it does something.
data recovery nightmare (Score:5, Insightful)
"Memory"? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:other FSs are out there (Score:5, Interesting)
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Re:other FSs are out there (Score:5, Informative)
Writes are about 10% less efficient, which a pretty good tradeoff for that peace of mind.
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Re:other FSs are out there (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:other FSs are out there (Score:5, Insightful)
And how would you propose to achieve that without performance going down the drain?
The guys writing these filesystems are not dumb, and the reasons why journals are used are well considered. Another thing is that ACID compliant databases also use something like a journal to achive the atomicity.
Oh, and forget softupdates, they are _not_ comparable to journaling filesystems, for instance you still need to fsck, it's just faster.
Compare that with one of the funnies manpages I know [sgi.com].
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Alas it doesn't help (Score:5, Informative)
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Re:other FSs are out there (Score:5, Informative)
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Re:other FSs are out there (Score:5, Informative)
Journalling makes sure that the state of data, or meta-data is always defined. So even if you turn the computer off while in the middle of a write command the file-system will be in a correct state afterwards. (The write operation will be lost however.) It is basically a way of making HDD operations atomic. Either they succeed or they fail, the in between state is what puts your drive in a corrupted state.
When talking about 10% it is refering to space on the disk for the log file to make this possible.
Now storing the meta data in a database, which is essentially what WinFS and such are doing, is not as clear a benfit. Personally I can imagine that it would be a very practiacal FS for keeping movies and MP3's on. I don't really see the benefits of running the OS files on that FS though. A lot of unneccesary overhead. (I don't search for files in my OS partition very often.)
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Performance is a question of whether they care (Score:5, Interesting)
The difference isn't features - BeFS supported everything HFS+ does and arbitrary attributes, journaling, much larger file/filesystem support, and indexing and it was still faster. Be simply made performance a much higher priority than Apple has so far; fortunately they've hired the BeFS lead developer and perhaps 10.3 will have some surprises.
Another good example is ReiserFS - while some of their choices reflect overall design goals (e.g. targeting large numbers of small files instead of BFS's massive videos) they've largely passed the traditional filesystems in most areas despite having to do more work to keep all of the extra features going.
Microsoft has a number of engineers who do understand performance; the question is simply whether it'll be a significant priority for them to make WinFS fast enough that we'll realistically be able to use it.
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Re:other FSs are out there (Score:5, Informative)
So when is the last time you actually used WindowsXP? What you said is pretty silly.
You can install WindowsXP on FAT32, even create FAT32 partitions during setup etc, all the same options you get with NTFS during the install.
Are you trying to make up stuff or just never used it?
Geeshâ¦
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Re:other FSs are out there (Score:5, Informative)
The limit is 32GBs.
FAT32 Formatting in Setup is an option, but is known to frequently fail or have significant errors
No it doesn't.
FAT 32 Formatting once you are in the OS requires 3rd Party wares.
Again, only if creating partitions bigger than 32GBs.
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Re:other FSs are out there (Score:5, Informative)
FAT32 Formatting in Setup is an option, but is known to frequently fail or have significant errors.
FAT 32 Formatting once you are in the OS requires 3rd Party wares.
SCO has performed an illegal operation and will be shut down.
I hate to rain on your parade, but the information you are providing you are either mixing with NT4 information or just making it up as you go.
Nothing I can say is convincing you, so let me reference you to the information you need.
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/pro/using/ho
It clearly provides information on the only limitations of doing a FAT32 installation of WindowsXP, and that is the inherent limitation of FAT32 only being able to recognize a 32GB partition size.
As for '(I belive)2Gb', you are referring to the FAT16 installation of NT4. It doesn't apply to WindowsXP.
FAT 32 Formatting once you are in the OS requires 3rd Party wares.
Here let me quote from a command prompt for your edificationâ¦
Format
Formats a disk for use with Windows XP.
FORMAT volume [/FS:file-system] [/V:label] [/Q] [/A:size] [/C] [/X]
FORMAT volume [/V:label] [/Q] [/F:size]
FORMAT volume [/V:label] [/Q] [/T:tracks
FORMAT volume [/V:label] [/Q]
FORMAT volume [/Q]
volume Specifies the drive letter (followed by a colon), mount point, or volume name.
Notice the last line?
So where do you get your information, tooth-fairy, or just make it up as you go? Third party utilities are NOT needed to format FAT32 in WindowsXP, as you said âonce you are in the OSâ(TM) â" BTW, did you know that even during Setup â" YOU ARE âIN THE OSâ(TM)? It is running a stub version of NT already at that point; you are already in the NT OS.
FAT32 Formatting in Setup is an option, but is known to frequently fail or have significant errors.
Since when? Where do you document this at? Funny in all the time our tech team has put into working with WindowsNT, they can find no reference to this, either online or in their own experience. Tooth-fairy again or just making it up as you go?
There are NO known issues or documented issues of WindowsNT EVER having a problem running on a FAT partition, either FAT16 from NT4 days or FAT32 of current days. The NT core has an installable File System, like most modern OSes, and its interaction with the file system underneath is irrelevant to how it operates in regard to failure or problems.
Besides, this is really a moot point. If you are running WindowsXP and it is your only OS, then there is NO reason not to use NTFS. It is faster with larger files, faster with large volumes, supports compression, supports encryption and can have partitions up to 16 exabytes in size.
If you are running WindowsXP on FAT32, you are missing half the benefits of WindowsXP and the security of NTFS as well as its reliability of sitting on a journalled file system, etc, etc.
Geesh.
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Re:other FSs are out there (Score:5, Informative)
AFAIK, the NTFS installation of NT4 won't allow you to have a primary (system) volume > 4GB. This is because NT will install a FAT16 volume and later convert it [is-it-true.org]. This may have been fixed in a service pack, but until you install the OS, how are you going to get a SP on there? Sure, you can
grow the partition later, but you're being a bit disingenuous in your specifying that this problem is confined to FAT16 installation on NT4, since an NTFS installation *uses* the FAT16 installation.
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Re:other FSs are out there (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:other FSs are out there (Score:5, Informative)
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Re:I can almost guarantee you.... (Score:5, Funny)
How about Clippy? "I see you're looking for your work files. You're fscked."
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Re:Can you say SQL Slammer x 100? (Score:5, Insightful)
How many gaping security holes have there been in NTFS?
By most accounts, NTFS is one of the better filesystems ever written. Journaling, ACLs, decent performance.
There is talent in Redmond. Ignoring that is as flawed as assuming the entire Linux community is represented by Sendmail and SCO (security holes and bad publicity). Pretty bad, right?
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Re:Can you say SQL Slammer x 100? (Score:5, Informative)
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Re:For lots of files... (Score:5, Interesting)
One word: FAT. You are making three assumptions here. The first is that the underlying implementation is capable of supporting near-infinite extension without degradation. Invalid for FAT, valid for the FS types mentioned in the grandparent, and the reason for what I said. The second is that the file system will be used as a hierarchy, which is invalid for most end users. The third is a combination of the first and second, being that the file system extends without unreasonable degradation to a vasst number of files in a single directory, and performing operations (esp. searches) on them quickly. This is invalid for all of these file systems, because of how they store metadata.
Again, you're assumiung you, a technically savvy user. End users don't behave like this. By and large they use meaningful file names in a single directory. If you're looking for a document someone else did, it will be in their single directory, not in a common folder for documents relating to that topic. If you don't know who worked on the document, you need to do a broad search based on keywords.
Which shows how little you've thought about the implementation of this system. You only have to make a change if the file metadata changes. In many file systems you already have to write that change in a different location to changes to the file itself (if you don't, your metadata search time goes out the window). If your "locate" database is a relational database, making a change has trivial overhead.
Actually, this isn't what I was meaning. I was referring to the relationship between the data in the FS and in the locate database (or any other metadata search database), and indicating that WinFS (in theory) takes out the step of building a separate database by using the database as the "index" of the file system. Unfortunately in this incarnation of WinFS (the current implementation) MS will not be implementing it quite in that fashion.
But to answer your point ... Win32 systems have had file change notification in their APIs from day 1 (NT 3.1 / Win95 + have FindFirstChangeNotification; NT 3.51 + have ReadDirectoryChangesW).
And that's pretty much what MS is doing by converging a tradition file system with a metadata view.
Of course, WinFS was intended for client operation systems, not servers. And while NTFS could still be improved, it doesn't make a lot of sense to do so: most high data volume applications store their data in structured files, and don't require much from the file system in any place where performance could be signficantly improved.
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