[CentOS] iSCSI, windows, & local linux access

Fri Feb 23 12:32:25 UTC 2007
Andrew Cotter <andrew.cotter at somersetcapital.com>

Hello all,

I am looking to build a larger array (6TB) using CentOS 4.4 to archive 
data to.  We want to have the Windows server mount this array as a local 
drive so we were looking at iSCSI to do it.  I have played with it in 
the past and gotten it to work in this combo, but I have a question 
about access to the data on the local (Centos) machine.

If I understand correctly, when I mount the device on windows, I need to 
format the array in a format that Windows (2003 server) can understand. 
     Also, iSCSI only allows you to mount the array on one server at a 
time.  Once I do that and write files to this array, is there anyway to 
access those files from the local machine (Centos)?  I may want to do 
things like rsync to another location, copy files to another removable 
SATA disk, or just plain delete something.

Is it a choice of the OS so both windows and linux can read it?  Little 
help with which one then.  I know NTFS is still somewhat in its infancy.

Any thoughts would be much appreciated!

Andrew