XFS
High Performance Scalable File System
XFS is a high-performing, journaling Linux file system. Originally developed by Silicon Graphics, Inc. (SGI), it became part of the mainline Linux Kernel with version 2.4. With the release of Oracle Linux 6.4, customers with Premier Support subscriptions are entitled to XFS support, at no additional charge.
XFS is designed for high scalability and provides near native I/O performance even when the file system spans multiple storage devices. Here are several of the features which make XFS suitable for very large file systems:
| Features | Benefits |
|---|---|
| Quick Recovery | The XFS journaling technology provides rapid restarts after unexpected disruptions and avoids lengthy filesystem checks traditionally seen with restarts. This is a result of the journaling features for metadata operations implemented by XFS. |
| Massive Scalability | XFS is a full 64-bit filesystem and in theory it is capable of handling filesystems as large as 8 Exabytes For Oracle Linux, we support up to 100TB. |
| Fast Transactions | XFS provides the benefits of a journaling file system without the hit to performance by leveraging tree structures for fast search and space allocations. |
| Efficient Allocations | XFS introduced the implementation of delayed space allocation for buffered writes to file systems, which allows it to allocate based on the configuration of the underlying storage device, reducing fragmentation and increasing performance. |
| Excellent Bandwidth | XFS is capable of delivering near raw I/O performance. Direct I/O in XFS implements high throughput by allocating DMA between an application and storage device, utilizing the fully I/O bandwidth of the device. |
For more information on features, installing and configuring XFS on Oracle Linux, please refer to Chapter 6: The XFS File System in the Oracle Linux Administrator's Solution Guide.