From owner-freebsd-chat@FreeBSD.ORG Sun Jul 27 02:27:57 2003 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-chat@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.FreeBSD.org (mx1.freebsd.org [216.136.204.125]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 249F237B401 for ; Sun, 27 Jul 2003 02:27:57 -0700 (PDT) Received: from phoenix.welearn.com.au (phoenix.welearn.com.au [139.130.44.81]) by mx1.FreeBSD.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id CE5E243F3F for ; Sun, 27 Jul 2003 02:27:54 -0700 (PDT) (envelope-from sue@welearn.com.au) Received: from phoenix.welearn.com.au (localhost [127.0.0.1]) h6R9RkiS059731; Sun, 27 Jul 2003 19:27:46 +1000 (EST) (envelope-from sue@phoenix.welearn.com.au) Received: (from sue@localhost) by phoenix.welearn.com.au (8.12.8/8.12.8/Submit) id h6R9Ri8s059730; Sun, 27 Jul 2003 19:27:44 +1000 (EST) (envelope-from sue) Date: Sun, 27 Jul 2003 19:27:44 +1000 From: Sue Blake To: Lowell Gilbert Message-ID: <20030727192744.A5069@welearn.com.au> Mail-Followup-To: Sue Blake , Lowell Gilbert , freebsd-chat@freebsd.org, Peter Rosa References: <004501c3521d$e8532c40$3501a8c0@pro.sk> <44brvjhdl4.fsf@be-well.ilk.org> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Disposition: inline User-Agent: Mutt/1.2.5i In-Reply-To: <44brvjhdl4.fsf@be-well.ilk.org>;at 04:30:47PM -0400 X-PGP-Fingerprint: E9A3 7B97 C563 DBB1 979E BC04 D2A2 9DA3 1274 7885 cc: Peter Rosa cc: freebsd-chat@freebsd.org Subject: Re: Defragment HDD X-BeenThere: freebsd-chat@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.1 Precedence: list List-Id: Non technical items related to the community List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Sun, 27 Jul 2003 09:27:57 -0000 On Thu, Jul 24, 2003 at 04:30:47PM -0400, Lowell Gilbert wrote: > "Peter Rosa" writes: > > > OK, but it is not the "real defragmenting" like Norton Speedisk > > or MS Defrag on windoze machines. > > Is there anything other ? > > The term doesn't typically refer to quite the same thing on Unix. No > defragmentation program of that type is needed, due to different filesystem > internals. See the old (but still useful) /usr/share/doc/smm/05.fastfs > for a bit of a better introduction. You'd be surprised how common this defrag request is... and how useful those old docs can be. Recently I had the head of IT and the VMS administrator standing over me and demanding that I defrag the unix servers routinely once a month, like the VMS guy always does and the Microsoft guy had agreed to. They'd gone into a dramatically serious little whisperfest before they marched over and started throwing accusations and demands, refusing any response that sounded like "but". Oh they were quite serious, believing that Microsoft and VMS need it therefore every filesystem does, and they wouldn't accept that it is unnecessary for unix, no matter what I told them, nor could they explain to me why the venerable VMS had such a lousy filesystem that in this day and age it still falls over its feet whenever it gets fragmented which is often. They were convinced that I just didn't care about defragmentation or know the right tools to use, and no amount of reason would shake that. I was, of course, unable to comply with the manager's parting directive and said so. While waiting for advice that the room had been booked for my pending disciplinary interview, I emailed the abovementioned fastfs doc to the guys concerned, offered to accept an equivalent doc for VMS, and asked them to explain to me again what "defragging" does when they know how the unix filesystem works. I have not heard a peep from the manager since, and not a soul has mentioned filesystems within my earshot again :-) -- Regards, -*Sue*-