FFS and minfree...

[Artem Tepponen]

> From: Charles Swiger [mailto:cswiger at mac.com]
> Sent: Monday, May 05, 2003 10:47 PM

> > Should they be asking 'Why FS design is so flawed
> > that it has this [minfree] requirement' instead?
> 
> No.

Good answer. Explains everything.

> > Is there any working FS for FreeBSD that does not have this 
> > requirement?
> 
> The FFS doesn't have a requirement that you reserve any free space, 
> although doing so is a reasonable default for most 
> circumstances due to the performance advantages.

Were those defaults reasonable when disks were small and files
usually were in 100k range? I suspect many of my files are
a bit larger.

More precise question: will I lose anything performance wise
if I'll drop minfree to 0% and partition where this happens
contains primarily files in 5Mb+ range?

> Do you enjoy having to defragment other filesystem types, by 
> any chance?

Background defragmenter/cleaner/whatever running at 3am
actually wouldn't bother me too much. But I do enjoy having
a few gigs more. There is no such thing as too much storage.

Artem