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Bug 451596 - ext4 is the stable linux filesystem now
Summary: ext4 is the stable linux filesystem now
Status: RESOLVED FIXED
Alias: None
Product: [OLD] Docs on www.gentoo.org
Classification: Unclassified
Component: Installation Handbook (show other bugs)
Hardware: All Linux
: Normal enhancement (vote)
Assignee: Sven Vermeulen (RETIRED)
URL:
Whiteboard:
Keywords:
: 489460 (view as bug list)
Depends on:
Blocks:
 
Reported: 2013-01-13 00:00 UTC by SpanKY
Modified: 2013-11-28 20:19 UTC (History)
3 users (show)

See Also:
Package list:
Runtime testing required: ---


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Description SpanKY gentoo-dev 2013-01-13 00:00:41 UTC
ext4 is stable and has been for a long time.  it's anachronistic to tell people to format their rootfs with ext3 nowadays.  telling them to format their /boot with ext2 is OK though.

there's a few places we need to fix up:
 - /etc/fstab - tell it to use "ext4" for all ext[234] filesystems.  the kernel handles this just fine and keeps people from having to enable ext[23] support in the kernel.
 - rootfs - tell people to format it as ext4 now
 - filesystems section - it says that ext4: "is a compromise between production-grade code stability and the desire to introduce extensions to an almost decade old filesystem".  that is no longer true and that should be updated.
Comment 1 Martin Väth 2013-01-13 09:11:40 UTC
(In reply to comment #0)
> telling them to format their /boot with ext2 is OK though.

It would perhaps be even better to recommend (at least for /boot)

  ext4 + "-O ^has_journal"

so that no ext2/3 support (not even emulation) is needed in the kernel.
If you look in the net you will see that this is also the mode developed
and used by google, perhaps even for some of their main data, so I guess
that this mode is also reasonably tested as well.
Comment 2 SpanKY gentoo-dev 2013-01-13 17:32:06 UTC
(In reply to comment #1)

i don't think that's a good idea as we'd have to make sure all the various bootloaders out there can read ext4.  it's not worth the pain.

as for the kernel, there is no option to disable reading of ext2/ext3 filesystems by the ext4 driver.  so there is no "extra" overhead from formatting as ext2.
Comment 3 Sven Vermeulen (RETIRED) gentoo-dev 2013-01-20 16:05:53 UTC
I'm okay with this. Anyone any objections?

I *thought* I saw a discussion on this on a mailinglist before, but none of the archives seem to find it so it probably was a lucid dream of mine :-/
Comment 4 SpanKY gentoo-dev 2013-01-28 23:49:26 UTC
i've updated our default /etc/fstab:
http://sources.gentoo.org/baselayout/trunk/share.Linux/fstab?r1=3205&r2=3206
Comment 5 Sven Vermeulen (RETIRED) gentoo-dev 2013-02-23 18:39:07 UTC
Okay, ext4 is now marked as the "recommended" file system (well, meaning it is used in most examples :p)
Comment 6 SpanKY gentoo-dev 2013-11-28 20:19:39 UTC
*** Bug 489460 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***