Appendix A. File Systems in Linux

Table of Contents

A.1. Glossary
A.2. Major File Systems in Linux
A.3. Some Other Supported File Systems
A.4. Large File Support in Linux
A.5. For More Information

Abstract

Linux supports a number of different file systems. This chapter presents a brief overview of the most popular Linux file systems, elaborating on their design concept, advantages, and fields of application. Some additional information about LFS (“Large File Support”) in Linux is also provided.

A.1. Glossary

metadata

A file system–internal data structure that assures all the data on disk is properly organized and accessible. Essentially, it is “data about the data.” Almost every file system has its own structure of metadata, which is partly why the file systems show different performance characteristics. It is of major importance to maintain metadata intact, because otherwise all data on the file system could become inaccessible.

inode

Inodes contain various information about a file, including size, number of links, date and time of creation, modification, and access, as well as pointers to the disk blocks where the file contents are actually stored.

journal

In the context of a file system, a journal is an on-disk structure containing a kind of log in which the file system stores what it is about to change in the file system's metadata. Journaling greatly reduces the recovery time of a Linux system because it obsoletes the lengthy search process that checks the whole file system at system start-up. Instead, only the journal is replayed.