ZFS...

[Paul Mather]

On Apr 30, 2019, at 8:14 PM, Michelle Sullivan <michelle at sorbs.net> wrote:

>
>
> Michelle Sullivan
> http://www.mhix.org/
> Sent from my iPad
>
>> On 01 May 2019, at 01:15, Karl Denninger <karl at denninger.net> wrote:
>>
>>
>> IMHO non-ECC memory systems are ok for personal desktop and laptop
>> machines where loss of stored data requiring a restore is acceptable
>> (assuming you have a reasonable backup paradigm for same) but not for
>> servers and *especially* not for ZFS storage.  I don't like the price of
>> ECC memory and I really don't like Intel's practices when it comes to
>> only enabling ECC RAM on their "server" class line of CPUs either but it
>> is what it is.  Pay up for the machines where it matters.
>
> And the irony is the FreeBSD policy to default to zfs on new installs  
> using the complete drive.. even when there is only one disk available and  
> regardless of the cpu or ram class...  with one usb stick I have around  
> here it attempted to use zfs on one of my laptops.


ZFS has MUCH more to recommend it than just the "self-healing" properties  
discussed in this thread.  Its pooled storage model, good administration  
and snapshot/clone support (enabling features such as boot environments)  
make it preferable over UFS as a default file system.  You can even gain  
the benfits of self-healing (for silent data corruption) for single-drive  
systems via "copies=2" or "copies=3" on file sets.


> Damned if you do, damned if you don’t comes to mind.


Not really.  Nobody is forcing anyone only to use ZFS as a choice of file  
system.  As you say above, it is a default (a very sensible one, IMHO, but  
even then, it's not really a default).  If you believe ZFS is not right for  
you, do a UFS installation instead.

BTW, I disagree that you need top-notch server-grade hardware to use ZFS.   
Its design embodies the notion of being distrustful of the hardware on  
which it is running, and it is targeted to be able to survive consumer  
hardware (as has been pointed out elsewhere in this thread), e.g., HBAs  
without BBUs.

I am using ZFS on a Raspberry Pi with an external USB drive.  How's that  
for server-grade hardware? :-)

Cheers,

Paul.