On Mon, Oct 15, 2001 at 08:39:48PM +0000, Martin Webster wrote:

On Monday 15 October 2001 7:20 pm, Erik Jakobsen wrote:

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If I want to use the Reiserfs system, how do I then give it a start ??.

First, you need to decide how you want to partition your hard disk(s). Then during the install process select Expert partitioning in YaST2 to identify your partitions and select the filesystem types. I always set /boot as ext2, but some prefer all ReiserFS although I can't undertstand why.

BTW, what version are you running? Thought about LVM too?

M

It is pointless making /boot reiser, besides which you have to make it big enough for reiser to take an interest in it, around 35MB I recall, which is a bit overkill for /boot. Lots of folks worry about using root as reiserfs as well. You are more likely to lose data with reiser in a system crash, and it is slightly slower than EXT2 in operation. This probably is not of much concern unless you run a very high volume mail server or some such. It whizzes through efsck's though :) That aside, I cannot quite see what is so great about it. -- Regards Cliff

On Tue, Oct 16, 2001 at 12:36:17AM +0000, Martin Webster wrote:

On Monday 15 October 2001 10:36 pm, Cliff Sarginson wrote:

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On Mon, Oct 15, 2001 at 08:39:48PM +0000, Martin Webster wrote:

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On Monday 15 October 2001 7:20 pm, Erik Jakobsen wrote:

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If I want to use the Reiserfs system, how do I then give it a start ??.

First, you need to decide how you want to partition your hard disk(s). Then during the install process select Expert partitioning in YaST2 to identify your partitions and select the filesystem types. I always set /boot as ext2, but some prefer all ReiserFS although I can't undertstand why.

It is pointless making /boot reiser, besides which you have to make it big enough for reiser to take an interest in it, around 35MB I recall, which is a bit overkill for /boot.

I agree with you here.

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Lots of folks worry about using root as reiserfs as well.

No problems here; / (root) should be pretty much static once everythings set-up anyway.

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You are more likely to lose data with reiser in a system crash, and it is slightly slower than EXT2 in operation. This probably is not of much concern unless you run a very high volume mail server or some such.

I'm afraid I don't agree with you here. A journaling file system should be more robust since any changes are recorded in the journal before being written to disk.

I understand what you are saying, but there are some reports on the web of this actually happening - although I believe it may have applied to somewhat earlier versions than the current one, and again I think these applied to very heavy-duty server systems.

Anyway, filesystem type isn't a subsitute for a good backup regime.

Of course not.

Under some circumstances ReiserFS is faster than ext2 since it's more efficient; particularly where lots of small files are stored in a directory.

Mmm. This is of course a very difficult thing to measure; however reiserfs does have to do something extra for the journaling, and it would be slower in that regard...again I think this may apply more to serious server systems.

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It whizzes through efsck's though :)

Yep, it sure does.

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That aside, I cannot quite see what is so great about it.

Like everything else, it's your choice. ;-)

Of course it is my choice :). I think my point is that I do not quite understand what it's great attraction is..file system checking aside.

The most important thing is to select multiple partitions vis-à-vis a single / (root) partition. The choice of filesystem is secondary to this.

Ah but that is another religious discussion :) -- Regards Cliff

On Tuesday 16 October 2001 10:31 am, Nick Zentena wrote:

On October 16, 2001 01:14 am, Cliff Sarginson wrote:

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On Tue, Oct 16, 2001 at 12:36:17AM +0000, Martin Webster wrote:

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It is pointless making /boot reiser, besides which you have to make it big enough for reiser to take an interest in it, around 35MB I recall, which is a bit overkill for /boot.

In a day when 40gig drives are becoming the norm 35MB is not an issue on new systems. Not that it needs to be that big. I think 10MB is the recomended size.

Nick

I believe that reiserfs has a minimum of about 30MB for a partition. Can't be less. -- +----------------------------------------------------------------------------+ + Bruce S. Marshall bmarsh@bmarsh.com Bellaire, MI 10/16/01 10:43 + +----------------------------------------------------------------------------+ "A goldfish has a memory span of three seconds."

This was fixed soon after 7.1 shipped. Check the list archives. Jeffrey Quoting Christian Klippel :

hi,

after all, you can not make the /boot partition a reiser fs, or linux wont boot any longer. at boot time, lilo doesnt know about reiser and can not load the kernel image from there. it _MUST_ be ext2 to boot from that.

greets,

chris

Am Dienstag, 16. Oktober 2001 16:31 schrieb Nick Zentena:

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On October 16, 2001 01:14 am, Cliff Sarginson wrote:

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On Tue, Oct 16, 2001 at 12:36:17AM +0000, Martin Webster wrote:

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It is pointless making /boot reiser, besides which you have to make it big enough for reiser to take an interest in it, around 35MB I recall, which is a bit overkill for /boot.

In a day when 40gig drives are becoming the norm 35MB is not an issue on new systems. Not that it needs to be that big. I think 10MB is the recomended size.

Nick

-- I don't do Windows and I don't come to work before nine. -- Johnny Paycheck

On October 16, 2001 10:46 am, Christian Klippel wrote:

hi,

after all, you can not make the /boot partition a reiser fs, or linux wont boot any longer. at boot time, lilo doesnt know about reiser and can not load the kernel image from there. it _MUST_ be ext2 to boot from that.

zentena@hophead:~> more /etc/fstab /dev/hda4 swap swap defaults 0 0 /dev/hda2 / reiserfs defaults,notail 1 1 /dev/hda6 /var reiserfs defaults 1 2 /dev/hda8 /opt reiserfs defaults 1 2 /dev/hda10 /usr reiserfs defaults 1 2 /dev/hda12 /tmp reiserfs defaults 1 2 /dev/hda9 /home reiserfs defaults 1 2 /dev/hda11 /usr/local reiserfs defaults 1 2 /dev/hda7 /var/spool reiserfs defaults 1 2 /dev/hda1 /dos vfat defaults 1 2 /dev/hda5 /dosd vfat defaults 1 2 /dev/cdrom /cdrom auto ro,noauto,user,exec 0 0 /dev/cdrom1 /cdrom1 auto ro,noauto,user,exec 0 0 /dev/fd0 /floppy auto noauto,user 0 0 none /proc proc defaults 0 0 No boot on this machine just / everything but the windows stuff is reiserfs. Boots just fine. The kernel includes what you put in it-)) Nick

Right, I have Reiser in the boot partition of versions of SLES and 7.2+, it really does not make much sense as boot is usually less than 64mega and the journal eats some of this space, so a ext2 partition, even with an fsck will be fast on a small boot partition. However, you can stick Reiser on it if you like. Your init_rd also needs to have the reiserfs modules BTW, which is there in default installs when you partition Reiser. If you fool around with kernel builds and the like, remember to build an init_rd calling the script with mk_initrd, and having your modules in rc.config, especially the SCSI modules if you boot off a RAID device and the like. Regards, Jon On Tue, 16 Oct 2001, Jonathan Paul Cowherd wrote:

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hi, after all, you can not make the /boot partition a reiser fs, or linux wont boot any longer. at boot time, lilo doesnt know about reiser and can not load the kernel image from there. it _MUST_ be ext2 to boot from that. greets, chris

Chris, this isn't true.

Lilo doesn't recognize any filesystem. Lilo just has a "pointer" to a location on the HD where to find the kernel and once the kernel is loaded, the filesystem is activated, etc. That is why there is the 1024 cylinder limit and on HDs that don't report the correct drive geometry, you'll get things like "LI" or "LIL" when booting up, which has nothing to do with the filesystem.

I've had kernels on reiserFS, vFAT, HPFS, and ext2 to name a few.

The kernel you load must have support for your filesystem built in or it won't be able to mount your volumes, but that has nothing to do with lilo.

Jonathan

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On 16 Oct 2001, Christian Klippel wrote:

after all, you can not make the /boot partition a reiser fs, or linux wont boot any longer. at boot time, lilo doesnt know about reiser and can not load the kernel image from there. it _MUST_ be ext2 to boot from that.

No, it doesn't. Initially, LILO reiserfs support was totally absent (while GRUB did support it). Later, the "noatail" mount option allowed LILO to boot off a reiserfs partition. Starting with version 21.4 I believe, full-fledged reiserfs support came about. This is how I do it, BTW, although I'm changing that really soon. -- noodlez: Karol Pietrzak PGP KeyID: 0x3A1446A0

On October 16, 2001 01:18 pm, Philipp Thomas wrote:

* Nick Zentena [Tue, 16 Oct 2001 10:31:00 -0400]:

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In a day when 40gig drives are becoming the norm 35MB is not an issue on new systems. Not that it needs to be that big. I think 10MB is the recomended size.

The point is, that reiserfs *always* needs approx. 30 MB for its log file. So it's only usable for partitions larger then that.

Yes but drives are so big today that it isn't a serious issue for many users. If Reiser provides benefits then the space used shouldn't be a problem. Nick

On 16 Oct 2001, Philipp Thomas wrote:

The point is, that reiserfs *always* needs approx. 30 MB for its log file. So it's only usable for partitions larger then that.

Not quite true... you can edit the source to "mkreiserfs" (it's a single line change) and make the journal as big / small as you want it. Of course, a journaling filesystem is totally useless on a 30MB partition, IMO. -- noodlez: Karol Pietrzak PGP KeyID: 0x3A1446A0

* Martin Webster [Tue, 16 Oct 2001 00:36:17 +0000]:

On Monday 15 October 2001 10:36 pm, Cliff Sarginson wrote: A journaling file system should be more robust since any changes are recorded in the journal before being written to disk.

Just don't forget that nearly all journaling file systems, at least by default, only journal meta data (directory and file info). There is nearly *no* data journaling, only ext3 offers it but at a speed penalty. So journaling does save you time at fsck but it is no substitute for a regular backup. Philipp -- "The idea that Bill Gates has appeared like a knight in shining armour to lead all customers out of a mire of technological chaos neatly ignores the fact that it was he who, by peddling second-rate technology, led them into it in the first place." - Douglas Adams in Guardian, 25-Aug-95