This section compares features and capabilities of Novell® Storage Services™ on Linux to Linux traditional file systems, such as EXT3 and ReiserFS.
|
Feature Description |
NSS on OES Linux with NCP Server |
Linux Traditional File Systems with NCP Server |
|---|---|---|
|
Management interfaces |
Novell iManager Storage plug-in NSSMU for Linux EVMS (evmsgui) Utilities in the server console (nssmu, rights, nsscon, ravsui, ravview) Commands in the NSS Console (nsscon) Novell Remote Manager for Linux (browse only) |
Novell iManager NCP™ Server plug-in YaST EVMS (evmsgui) Terminal commands Commands in the NCP Console (ncpcon) |
|
File system trustees and trustee rights to control access to directories and files |
Novell NetStorage Novell Client™. See
Rights utility for Linux. See
|
NCP Server |
|
File system directory and file attributes to control functions available for directories and files |
Novell NetStorage Novell Client (NCP) Novell Remote Manager for Linux. See
|
NCP Server |
|
Directory quotas |
Requires the Directory Quotas attribute. Novell NetStorage Novell Client |
No |
|
User space quotas (user space restrictions) |
Yes, for OES Linux SP1 and later |
No |
|
Default mount location for NSS pools |
/opt/novell/nss/mnt/.pools/ |
N/A |
|
Default mount location for NSS volumes |
/media/nss/ |
N/A |
|
Default mount location for devices managed by EVMS |
/dev/evms/ |
/dev/evms/ |
|
Interface |
64-bit |
64-bit |
|
Character format |
Unicode |
UTF-8 |
|
Maximum device size recognized (physical or logical) |
2 TB |
2 TB |
|
Maximum partition size |
2 TB |
2 TB |
|
Maximum number of partitions (logical or physical devices) per pool |
No practical limit A partition must have more than 10 MB and less than 2 TB of available space to be recognized by NSS. |
Not applicable |
|
Maximum pool size (using at least 4 partitions of up to 2 TB each) |
8 TB |
16 TB |
|
Minimum pool size |
10 MB |
N/A |
|
Maximum size of a volume |
Up to 8 TB, depending on the pool size and available space in the pool. Volume quotas can be overbooked. For information, see Section 13.1, Understanding NSS Volumes. |
Up to 16 TB, depending on the file system. |
|
Maximum file size |
Up to 8 TB, depending on the volume size and available space in the volume. |
Up to 8 TB, depending on the file system used, the volume size, and available space in the volume. |
|
Maximum number of files per volume |
Up to 8 trillion (10E12), regardless of how many name spaces are loaded. |
Up to 8 trillion (10E12), regardless of how many name spaces are loaded. |
|
Maximum number of files open concurrently |
1 million (10E6) |
Millions (10E6), depending on the file system |
|
Maximum number of volumes per server |
Unlimited NSS data volumes, but only 255 can be mounted at a time |
Unlimited |
|
Time to mount a volume |
Requires only a few seconds NSS uses a journaling file system and does not need to scan the entire file system to create a directory entry table (DET) and to load a File Allocation Table (FAT). |
Depends on the file system; from a few seconds to a few minutes. Journaled file systems take only a few seconds. |
|
Volume name space |
UNIX is the default name space, which is case sensitive. However, you can specify the Long name spaces on mounting the NSS volume to make its directory names and filenames case insensitive. For example:
mount ns=namespace
Valid name space values are dos, mac, long, or unix. |
UNIX; no support for case insensitive names. |
|
File compression |
Yes |
No |
|
Volume encryption |
Yes, for OES Linux SP1 and later |
Yes; ReiserFS |
|
Time to repair corrupted volume |
Up to several hours, depending on the volume size. |
Up to several hours, depending on the volume size |
|
Multiple connection paths to storage media |
No; use the Linux Multi-Disk driver support for mutlipath I/O instead |
Yes, the Linux Multi-Disk (MD) driver supports multipath I/O. (NCP is not required to make this work.) |
|
Software RAID support |
RAID 0, 1, 5, and 10. RAIDs 10 and 15 can be created with NSSMU. |
RAID 0, 1, 4, and 5. RAIDs 10 and 15 can be created with EVMS tools for EVMS-managed volumes. |
|
Distributed File Services |
No |
No |
|
Data shredding |
Yes, up to 7 times |
|
|
Transaction Tracking System™ (TTS™) |
No |
No |
|
File snapshot attribute (make a temporary snapshot copy of an open file for backup) |
Yes; allows backup to continue without deactivating volume and back up open file |
No |
|
Pool snapshot (retain point-in-time version of a pool using block-level copy on write) |
Not via NSS. However, EVMS supports device snapshots for the devices it manages, including those containing NSS partitions. |
Depends on the file system. EVMS supports device snapshots for the devices it manages. |
|
Backup support |
Yes |
No |
|
Device maintenance support |
Activate and deactivate devices by pool. |
|
|
CD and DVD device recognition |
No; use Linux options instead |
Yes |
|
Operating system version detection |
Default process |
Default process |
|
Cache balancing for NSS cache buffers |
Cache for NSS is limited to about 60% of the cache assigned to the Linux kernel memory, which has its own maximum of 1 GB. NSS does not use Linux HighMem. You can specify a minimum cache buffer size. For information, see Configuring the System Cache to Fine-Tune NSS Performance (Linux). |
Integrated with the Linux file system cache. |
|
Ability to access DOS partitions on the NetWare server |
No; use Linux options instead |
Yes |
|
Data migration |
Yes |
Yes |
|
Novell Archive and Version Services |
No |
No |