[KLUG Members] issues with AOL

[Bryan-TheBS-Smith]

Bruce Smith wrote:
> What do you think about the fact that Roswell (Redhat 7.1.93)
> offers ext3 as an install option?

I haven't used the latest Ext3 0.9.x releases yet, but they should be
"as solid" as Ext2 for kernel 2.4.  That's the "problem."  I don't find
Ext2 to be "solid" on 2.4, nor a number of other things to be "solid"
under 2.4 yet.  Even SGI modifies the _core_ 2.4 internals it its XFS
CVS tree and releases (including their modified RedHat RPM releases). 
SGI does a _lot_ of internal testing and has found various VM issues
over and over (most users who come in and find "issues" with XFS
actually find yet another 2.4 VM issue).

With that said, Stephen Tweedie (the guy behind Ext2/Ext3) and I have
had some dialog.  I "criticized" him on moving forward on meta-data
journaling with Ext3, instead of just sticking with full-data
journaling.  I was under the _in_correct assumption that Ext3 full-data
journaling, which is little more than "double buffering" on kernel 2.2,
could be done on kernel 2.4.  I was wrong.  Because of the way the VM
subsystem acts and reacts to the VFS in kernel 2.4, both Ext2 and Ext3
had to be heavily re-written for 2.4.  That also means that full-data
journaling Ext3 doesn't work on 2.4 like it does on 2.2 (and Tweedie has
warned me that he has NOT extensively tested the full-data journaling
mode of Ext3 on 2.4).

As such, I only use full-data journaling Ext3 on kernel 2.2 -- usually
through early releases like Ext3 0.0.2f (in VALinux kernel
2.2.16-21.7.1).  For kernel 2.4, I'd stick with RedHat's beta kernel
that does meta-data journaling, or a "Tweedie-approved"
release/patchset.  More of an issue than just the kernel is the
"e2fsprogs" package.  Tweedie recommends e2fsprogs 1.23-WIP (work in
progress) rather than the release package (alas, such is the story of
Ext3's life -- always use the latest WIP e2fsprogs).

I just simplify things, I use SGI's XFS kernels.  Be it from their CVS
tree (which is a heavily patched, but stock kernel) or their RPM
releases (in-line with RedHat releases and updates -- including all
RedHat patches).  They are _very_well_tested_.  And when they are not,
SGI is _very_forward_ on telling you so.

-- TheBS

-- 
Bryan "TheBS" Smith    mailto:b.j.smith@ieee.org    chat:thebs413
Engineer  Absolute Value Systems, Inc.  http://www.linux-wlan.org
President     SmithConcepts, Inc.    http://www.SmithConcepts.com