From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 X-Spam-Checker-Version: SpamAssassin 3.4.4 (2020-01-24) on inbox.vuxu.org X-Spam-Level: X-Spam-Status: No, score=-1.0 required=5.0 tests=MAILING_LIST_MULTI autolearn=ham autolearn_force=no version=3.4.4 Received: (qmail 13688 invoked from network); 30 Aug 2021 13:07:53 -0000 Received: from minnie.tuhs.org (45.79.103.53) by inbox.vuxu.org with ESMTPUTF8; 30 Aug 2021 13:07:53 -0000 Received: by minnie.tuhs.org (Postfix, from userid 112) id E3B769D53C; Mon, 30 Aug 2021 23:07:50 +1000 (AEST) Received: from minnie.tuhs.org (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by minnie.tuhs.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id D410D9D52E; Mon, 30 Aug 2021 23:07:28 +1000 (AEST) Received: by minnie.tuhs.org (Postfix, from userid 112) id A18AE9D52D; Mon, 30 Aug 2021 23:07:26 +1000 (AEST) Received: from oclsc.com (oclsc.com [206.248.137.164]) by minnie.tuhs.org (Postfix) with SMTP id 8CBBF9D52B for ; Mon, 30 Aug 2021 23:07:25 +1000 (AEST) Received: by lignose.oclsc.org (Postfix, from userid 1000) id A7D4C640CC6; Mon, 30 Aug 2021 09:06:03 -0400 (EDT) To: tuhs@tuhs.org Message-Id: <20210830130603.A7D4C640CC6@lignose.oclsc.org> Date: Mon, 30 Aug 2021 09:06:03 -0400 (EDT) From: norman@oclsc.org (Norman Wilson) Subject: Re: [TUHS] Is it time to resurrect the original dsw (delete with switches)? X-BeenThere: tuhs@minnie.tuhs.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.26 Precedence: list List-Id: The Unix Heritage Society mailing list List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , Errors-To: tuhs-bounces@minnie.tuhs.org Sender: "TUHS" Not to get into what is soemthing of a religious war, but this was the paper that convinced me that silent data corruption in storage is worth thinking about: http://www.cs.toronto.edu/~bianca/papers/fast08.pdf A key point is that the character of the errors they found suggests it's not just the disks one ought to worry about, but all the hardware and software (much of the latter inside disks and storage controllers and the like) in the storage stack. I had heard anecdotes long before (e.g. from Andrew Hume) suggesting silent data corruption had become prominent enough to matter, but this paper was the first real study I came across. I have used ZFS for my home file server for more than a decade; presently on an antique version of Solaris, but I hope to migrate to OpenZFS on a newer OS and hardware. So far as I can tell ZFS in old Solaris is quite stable and reliable. As Ted has said, there are philosophical reasons why some prefer to avoid it, but if you don't subscribe to those it's a fine answer. I've been hearing anecdotes since forever about sharp edges lurking here and there in BtrFS. It does seem to be eternally unready for production use if you really care about your data. It's all anecdotes so I don't know how seriously to take it, but since I'm comfortable with ZFS I don't worry about it. Norman Wilson Toronto ON PS: Disclosure: I work in the same (large) CS department as Bianca Schroeder, and admire her work in general, though the paper cited above was my first taste of it.