From owner-freebsd-stable@FreeBSD.ORG Mon Aug 29 20:47:14 2005 Return-Path: X-Original-To: freebsd-stable@freebsd.org Delivered-To: freebsd-stable@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.FreeBSD.org (mx1.freebsd.org [216.136.204.125]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id E770F16A41F; Mon, 29 Aug 2005 20:47:14 +0000 (GMT) (envelope-from mkb@incubus.de) Received: from luzifer.incubus.de (incubus.de [80.237.207.83]) by mx1.FreeBSD.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 777EA43D45; Mon, 29 Aug 2005 20:47:14 +0000 (GMT) (envelope-from mkb@incubus.de) Received: from drjekyll.mkbuelow.net (p54AA805F.dip0.t-ipconnect.de [84.170.128.95]) (using TLSv1 with cipher DHE-RSA-AES256-SHA (256/256 bits)) (No client certificate requested) by luzifer.incubus.de (Postfix) with ESMTP id 5AD3535876; Mon, 29 Aug 2005 22:50:06 +0200 (CEST) Received: from drjekyll.mkbuelow.net (mkb@localhost.mkbuelow.net [127.0.0.1]) by drjekyll.mkbuelow.net (8.13.3/8.13.3) with ESMTP id j7TKlFuB003421; Mon, 29 Aug 2005 22:47:15 +0200 (CEST) (envelope-from mkb@drjekyll.mkbuelow.net) Received: (from mkb@localhost) by drjekyll.mkbuelow.net (8.13.3/8.13.3/Submit) id j7TKlFLm003420; Mon, 29 Aug 2005 22:47:15 +0200 (CEST) (envelope-from mkb) Date: Mon, 29 Aug 2005 22:47:14 +0200 From: Matthias Buelow To: Chuck Swiger Message-ID: <20050829204714.GC1462@drjekyll.mkbuelow.net> References: <20050829120415.GA1462@drjekyll.mkbuelow.net> <200508291836.j7TIaVEk013147@gw.catspoiler.org> <20050829185933.GB1462@drjekyll.mkbuelow.net> <431362ED.9030800@mac.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Disposition: inline In-Reply-To: <431362ED.9030800@mac.com> User-Agent: Mutt/1.4.2.1i Cc: Don Lewis , freebsd-stable@freebsd.org Subject: Re: Sysinstall automatic filesystem size generation. X-BeenThere: freebsd-stable@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list List-Id: Production branch of FreeBSD source code List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Mon, 29 Aug 2005 20:47:15 -0000 Chuck Swiger wrote: >PS: Haven't we had this conversation before? Yes, indeed, and I don't want to reopen that issue since that would lead to no new insights (and since I don't have the time atm. to contribute anything I couldn't provide any stuff myself). I was just refuting the claim of "very robust" filesystem when power goes out in the context of 200GB consumer-grade hardware that this thread was talking about. I think until a satisfactory solution can be found (by making softupdates and/or a journalled filesystem as reliable as possible through mechanisms like write-request barriers and appropriate flushing at these) users who're running FreeBSD on end-consumer hardware (desktop PC as workstation or personal server) should be warned that softupdates does NOT work as described on their hardware and that the filesystem can easily be corrupted when the power goes out, no matter if softupdates is enabled or not. One often sees the "softupdates" argument being fielded by FreeBSD advocates, typically against Linux users with journalled fs, on web forums, usenet and other less authoritative (and knowledgable) places of discussion, and it is often presented as if it were some kind of magic bullet that makes filesystem corruption impossible. This simply is not so. mkb.