File-system for linux ?

Whether you are using Linux on the desktop or as a server, it's still good that you're using Linux. Linux related questions go here.

Moderator: General Moderators

Post Reply
methos
Forum Newbie
Posts: 13
Joined: Sat Oct 21, 2006 8:31 am

File-system for linux ?

Post by methos »

I have been using windows versions for years and have decided to move to linux. My HD's file-system is NTFS. What is a modern file-system for linux ? Any recommended programs for reformatting ?
Last edited by methos on Sun Feb 25, 2007 3:15 pm, edited 2 times in total.
User avatar
dude81
Forum Regular
Posts: 509
Joined: Mon Aug 29, 2005 6:26 am
Location: Pearls City

Post by dude81 »

by default ext3
User avatar
Jenk
DevNet Master
Posts: 3587
Joined: Mon Sep 19, 2005 6:24 am
Location: London

Post by Jenk »

you'll need to use ext2 for /boot and /swap, but ext3 is fine and dandy for any other partition you wish to make.
User avatar
Chris Corbyn
Breakbeat Nuttzer
Posts: 13098
Joined: Wed Mar 24, 2004 7:57 am
Location: Melbourne, Australia

Post by Chris Corbyn »

Jenk wrote:you'll need to use ext2 for /boot and /swap, but ext3 is fine and dandy for any other partition you wish to make.
Huh?

/boot and /swap use ext2?

Actually, /swap uses swapfs, and technically this would suffice as a file, no partition needed:

Code: Select all

dd if=/dev/zero of=/var/swap bs=1024 count=512
mkswap /var/swap
swapon /var/swap
/boot needs ext2? What bootloader are you using? Grub works with ext2, ext3, resierfs. Lilo definitely works with ext2 and 3; I cant say if it works with reiser. Is this what the Gentoo tutorials are feeding ya? ;)
User avatar
evilmonkey
Forum Regular
Posts: 823
Joined: Sun Oct 06, 2002 1:24 pm
Location: Toronto, Canada

Post by evilmonkey »

You can actually run Linux off NTFS nowdays. Take a look at NTFS-3G. BETA VERSION!
User avatar
jayshields
DevNet Resident
Posts: 1912
Joined: Mon Aug 22, 2005 12:11 pm
Location: Leeds/Manchester, England

Post by jayshields »

Get Solaris and make use of ZFS if you're all about file systems :)
User avatar
Jenk
DevNet Master
Posts: 3587
Joined: Mon Sep 19, 2005 6:24 am
Location: London

Post by Jenk »

d11wtq wrote:
Jenk wrote:you'll need to use ext2 for /boot and /swap, but ext3 is fine and dandy for any other partition you wish to make.
Huh?

/boot and /swap use ext2?

Actually, /swap uses swapfs, and technically this would suffice as a file, no partition needed:

Code: Select all

dd if=/dev/zero of=/var/swap bs=1024 count=512
mkswap /var/swap
swapon /var/swap
/boot needs ext2? What bootloader are you using? Grub works with ext2, ext3, resierfs. Lilo definitely works with ext2 and 3; I cant say if it works with reiser. Is this what the Gentoo tutorials are feeding ya? ;)
grub on ext3 was beta last I heard. My bad. :)
User avatar
Chris Corbyn
Breakbeat Nuttzer
Posts: 13098
Joined: Wed Mar 24, 2004 7:57 am
Location: Melbourne, Australia

Post by Chris Corbyn »

I'd like to have a go with some SQL filesystem. Anyone know of one for *nix? Isn't Windows Vista supposed to have integrated a SQLFS?
User avatar
Jenk
DevNet Master
Posts: 3587
Joined: Mon Sep 19, 2005 6:24 am
Location: London

Post by Jenk »

There is a fuse module libsqlfs, though that's only what google is telling me.
User avatar
Chris Corbyn
Breakbeat Nuttzer
Posts: 13098
Joined: Wed Mar 24, 2004 7:57 am
Location: Melbourne, Australia

Post by Chris Corbyn »

Cool. I have this Mac OS X at my fingertips here, and in truly ungeeky fashion I've barely experimented with compiling the mach kernel or anything. My point... I'm not sure if I can run things like fuse on OS X. I'll try it at work as I'm curious how it all goes together. It'd be pretty neat to run your entire OS on top of a SQL filesystem if you could get some console up to query it.
collette
Forum Newbie
Posts: 10
Joined: Thu Mar 15, 2007 1:23 pm

Post by collette »

The file system ext2 is old and slow but can be used for your boot partition. Better still, use ext3 (it is compatible with ext2 so you can almost always access your boot partition).

As for all the other partitions, use anything but ext2 and/or ext3. I have used Reiser file system, XFS and JFS. Currently all "other" partitions on my server are formatted with Reiser. It works perfectly, is fast enough for me and has some advantages over the other file systems. All my "other" partition are raid 5 with lvm2 on top. With Reiser it is possible and easy to shrink and to enlarge logical volumes.
I know, it can also been done with ext3, XFS and JFS, but not as easy as with Reiser.

As fas as I know, all Linux distro's support Reiser, while they not always support XFS and JFS.

There are circumstances where Reiser is not the best thing to choose. But if you are not running a large news-server, I think you will find Reiser also the best choose.

The bootloader I use is Lilo. The latest version of Lilo works with ext2, ext3, Reiser, XFS, JFS and some others. About Grub, don't ask me, never used it.
JohnLynx
Forum Newbie
Posts: 3
Joined: Thu Apr 05, 2007 7:09 am

Post by JohnLynx »

ext3 fs is really good, thats why I prefer Linux instead FreeBSD
Post Reply