Host Architectures File Systems & File System Protocols
File Systems
• The file system is a component of the storage infrastructure
• The file system can play a significant role in determining: –Performance – Reliability – Scalability
• Key considerations: – Maximum file system size and maximum file size – Directory schema – Crash recovery capabilities
File systems are essentially applications that organize and manage the data stored on storage devices.
File systems:
Keep track of free and allocated space Allocate and release disk space as files grow, shrink or are deleted Store and manage metadata important information about the files and about the file system itself Ensure the integrity of the data
File systems are important because they sit between the storage devices and the applications that use storage resources.
File systems help determine several aspects of the SAN: Its ability to support very large files and large numbers of files Its I/O performance profile Its ability to recover from a crash