Differences between version 5 and revision by previous author of FileSystem.
Other diffs: Previous Major Revision, Previous Revision, or view the Annotated Edit History
| Newer page: | version 5 | Last edited on Saturday, August 16, 2003 12:11:06 pm | by AristotlePagaltzis | Revert |
| Older page: | version 3 | Last edited on Thursday, July 31, 2003 2:15:31 pm | by CraigBox | Revert |
@@ -1,25 +1,12 @@
-Excellent idea
for a page
, but I'd refactor it somewhere (when I wasn't at work)
, perhaps into FileHierarchy or something
, and explain
on this page
what a filesystem was, ext2/ext3 etc, and how
the Windows analog is "FAT" or "NTFS"
.
+A FileSystem is basically a file format
for a disk. In order to use the diskspace
, you need a way to determine which parts are in use
, and where files are located
, how they're called
and so
on. This is
what a FileSystem provides. FileSystems lists
the many different kinds of [FileSystem]s currently in use
.
------
+If part of a FileSystem has been corrupted you need to be able to repair it. Under MicrosoftWindows the stock tool is called !ScanDisk. Unix systems call their corresponding tool fsck(8). fsck is automatically run if the FileSystem wasn't properly unmounted or hasn't been checked in a long time (the SuperUser can specify what constitutes a long time).
-The
Linux filesystem grows
from a main point "/" (Refered
to as root)
+On a [MicrosoftWindows] system, partitions are formatted with the old and aging [FAT] of the much more modern [NTFS] FileSystem. In contrast, the traditional FileSystem of choice on
Linux is [Ext2]. It is very trusty and rock solid - losing much data
from an [Ext2] partition is nearly impossible short of
a hardware failure. The only problem is that an fsck takes a very long time. On servers that don't get rebooted in months, this is not much of a headache, but Linux is making its way
to the desktop, where machines get rebooted frequently. Therefor, a variant that supports journalling was created: [Ext3].
-; __[/boot|SlashBoot]__ : Stores the kernel. Usuallly
a seperate [Partition] at
the beginning
of the hard drive
-; __[/bin|SlashBin]__ : System binary files (Programs) for use by all users
-; __[/dev|SlashDev]__ : Device files. Represent all devices connected
to your computer
-; __[/etc|SlashEtc]__ : Contains configuration files for programs
-; __[/home|SlashHome]__ : Each user has
a folder in here to store all their personal files
. Commonly refered to as '~'
.
-; __[/lib|SlashLib]__ : Contains libraries needed to run the programs
in /bin and /sbin
-; __[/mnt|SlashMnt]__ : Provides
a place
to 'mount' temporary filesystems (eg CDROM, floppy disk)
-; __[/opt|SlashOpt]__ : Location for add on software. Usually StaticallyLinked programs provided
in binary form
. Some people install TarBalls in here too
, expecially beta software.
-; __[/proc|SlashProc]__ : A "live window" in to kernel parameters.
-; __[/root|SlashRoot]__ : home directory of the root SuperUser
-; __[/sbin|SlashSbin]__ : Exectuable files
to be used only by the root SuperUser
-; __[/usr|SlashUsr]__ : For files that can be shared across a whole site among multiple users
-; __[/usr/local|SlashUsrSlashLocal]__ : Files that are installed from TarBalls usually install to here
. Contains a full directory structure (bin/, etc/)
-; __[/var|SlashVar]__ : For variable data files
+JournaledFileSystems keep
a log of changes pending completion, so in
the event
of a crash, they can quickly finish up or undo changes as required to bring
the FileSystem back
to a consistent state
. A full consistency check with fsck crawling the entire disk is then unnecessary
. Nevertheless, you should fsck partitions at least every once
in a blue moon
to ensure that no inconsistencies creep
in. The likelihood is low
, but better
to be safe than sorry
.
-More information can be found
at the [filesystem hierarchy standard|http://www
.pathname.com/fhs/2.2/]
+You may also want to look
at how
the FileSystemHierarchy is usually organized on a Linux machine
.
----
CategoryBeginners
