2.1 NSS File System

The NSS file System simplifies the ever-increasing demands of storage growth, provisioning, and management. NSS is a proven journaled file system that maintains its performance for large numbers of files and for small to large volume sizes.

NSS virtualizes all of the space available on the server’s storage devices. You can allocate segments of those resources to pools that span multiple devices, using your hardware to its maximum potential. NSS allows volumes to grow dynamically up to 8 terabytes (TB) within a pool of storage, based on your storage policies. You can also restrict space usage by pool, volume, directory, and user quotas.

In versions earlier than OES 11.x, NSS recognized only DOS devices up to 2 TB. So, multiple partitions were required to create an 8 TB pool; whereas in versions OES 11, OES 11 SP1, and OES 11 SP2, NSS recognized GPT (GUID Partition Table) partitioning scheme that lets you to create devices of any size. However, when you create an NSS pool, partitions up to 8 TB are allowed. The pool can grow up to a maximum of 8 TB.

Beginning with OES 2015, you can create a 64-bit pool (NSS64) that can grow beyond 8 TB to a maximum of 8 EB.

Regardless of the volume’s size or its number of files, NSS requires only 4 to 10 MB of server memory to mount the volume. NSS mounts an NSS volume in just three seconds and recovers it in under ten seconds, regardless of the size of the volume, for server crashes where no data is corrupted. If repairs are needed, file system repairs following a hardware failure take only minutes. Recovery of volumes where data corruption has occurred can take several minutes to several hours, depending on the size of the volume.

NSS can dynamically assign storage devices to a server to expand capacity. This means you can add, format, or partition new drives when the system is up and running.

NOTE:For Linux, the NSS file system volumes are used for data volumes only, not as system volumes. The Linux operating system requires a Linux file system that can be used as root (/) such as Btrfs, Ext2, Ext3, Reiser, or XFS.