From owner-freebsd-arch Wed Oct 27 20:56:59 1999 Delivered-To: freebsd-arch@freebsd.org Received: from ns1.yes.no (ns1.yes.no [195.204.136.10]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 662AE14C85 for ; Wed, 27 Oct 1999 20:56:56 -0700 (PDT) (envelope-from eivind@bitbox.follo.net) Received: from bitbox.follo.net (bitbox.follo.net [195.204.143.218]) by ns1.yes.no (8.9.3/8.9.3) with ESMTP id FAA18499 for ; Thu, 28 Oct 1999 05:56:55 +0200 (CEST) Received: (from eivind@localhost) by bitbox.follo.net (8.8.8/8.8.6) id FAA30638 for freebsd-arch@freebsd.org; Thu, 28 Oct 1999 05:56:55 +0200 (MET DST) Received: from alcanet.com.au (border.alcanet.com.au [203.62.196.10]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 848C614C85 for ; Wed, 27 Oct 1999 20:56:48 -0700 (PDT) (envelope-from jeremyp@gsmx07.alcatel.com.au) Received: by border.alcanet.com.au id <40328>; Thu, 28 Oct 1999 13:51:45 +1000 Content-return: prohibited Date: Thu, 28 Oct 1999 13:56:40 +1000 From: Peter Jeremy Subject: Storing small files in inodes To: freebsd-arch@freebsd.org Reply-To: peter.jeremy@alcatel.com.au Message-Id: <99Oct28.135145est.40328@border.alcanet.com.au> MIME-version: 1.0 X-Mailer: Mutt 1.0pre3i Content-type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Sender: owner-freebsd-arch@FreeBSD.ORG Precedence: bulk X-Loop: FreeBSD.ORG I'd like to float the possibility of storing small (<= 60 bytes) files and maybe directories inside inodes, in the same manner as short symlinks are stored. Looking through my main system, about 12.5% of inodes are allocated to short files and a further 3.5% are allocated to short directories. Advantages: - Faster access to the file (since the inode contains the contents, rather than a pointer to the contents). - In my case, saving about 1.3% of disk space though this would increase if I moved to a larger fragment size. Disadvantages: - Filesystem media incompatability Programs affected (based on the programs that have special handling for symlinks via MAXSYMLINKLEN or fs_maxsymlinklen): - fsck(8), fsdb(8) and dump(8) - libstand/ufs.c The kernel handling would be more complex than for symlinks because files additionally have the ability to be mmap'd and updated, but I don't believe the problems are insurmountable. Comments? Peter -- Peter Jeremy (VK2PJ) peter.jeremy@alcatel.com.au Alcatel Australia Limited 41 Mandible St Phone: +61 2 9690 5019 ALEXANDRIA NSW 2015 Fax: +61 2 9690 5982 To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-arch" in the body of the message