Project GRUDS: Handbook disk reorg

[Warren Block]

Project GRUDS (Grand Unified Disk Storage)

Goal: Edit and rewrite the scattered, repetitive, and conflicting Handbook
sections on disk storage into a unified group.  This would be a separate
<part> in the Handbook, starting where chapter 19, Storage, currently
begins.

The problem: Right now there are at least three different places in the
Handbook show disk partitioning methods and guidelines.  All are
different, and none really complete.  An in-depth chapter on
partitioning would allow sections to link to it and dispense with long
explanations that distract from the current topic.  Besides reducing
redundancy, this would make many sections shorter and let users familiar
with the concepts skip ahead easily.

It's a big project, but even as a plan would help future Handbook
contributions go in the right place.

Tentative outline:


Part 4:Disk Storage
   Introduction
     Quick start
       links to current methods for
         mirror (gmirror and ZFS)
         BIOS RAID (graid)
         RAID-5/RAID-Z (ZFS)

Disk Hardware Chapter
   Introduction
   Blocks
     512-byte
     Advanced Format
   Hardware RAID versus software RAID
     Comparison, advantages and disadvantages
   HAST?
   Device names
     SATA, IDE, SCSI, USB, most common hardware RAID device names
   Conclusion


Disk Partitions Chapter
   Introduction
   Partitioning Schemes
     Metadata (types, locations, conflicts)
     MBR
     GPT
     Others
   Conclusion


Labels Chapter (expanded from existing GEOM "Labeling Disk Devices")
   Introduction
     easy device relocatability
     provided by geom_label (others?)
   GPT labels
   Generic labels (glabel(8))
   Filesystem labels
   "Unique ID" labels
     GPT UUID
     ufsid
     others?
   Conclusion


GEOM Chapter ("Disk Device Transformations with GEOM"?)
   Introduction
     what is GEOM?
   from existing GEOM chapter
     additional section on graid(8)
     sorted in order of most common usage (gmirror, graid, ...)
   Conclusion


Filesystems Chapter
   Introduction
     what are filesystems?
   UFS
     traditional split-filesystem layout
     newer, unified everything in root layout
   Other filesystems
     ext2, NTFS, etc
     mention NFS, with pointer to NFS section in "Network Servers"
     mention ZFS, and how it is more than a filesystem, and will be
     covered in the next chapter
   Conclusion


ZFS Chapter
   neither fish nor fowl, it's a dessert topping *and* a floor wax
   both device and filesystem
   Introduction
     what is it?
     brief mention of best capabilities
   in-depth
   Conclusion


Backup Chapter
   Introduction
   UFS Backup (main part from existing Storage chapter)
   ZFS Backup
   Conclusion