On Thu, Apr 22, 2010 at 03:37:41PM -0500, Les Mikesell wrote: > On 4/22/2010 3:20 PM, Ray Van Dolson wrote: > > [ Wish there was a generic, active Linux "storage" mailing list out > > there -- something other than the kernel lists I mean ] > > > > To frame the discussion, we use VMware ESX (vSphere) quite a bit with > > NFS datastores. Often times with NetApp, but lately, more often with > > Solaris 10 + ZFS + SSD's for ZIL (intent log or write cache). > > > > The ZIL lets us use synchronous writes (safer) without the normal > > delay. Were we to try and get the same level of performance with > > Linux, we'd need to use async mode for our NFS shares -- and we'd lose > > some reliability. > > > > However, given the latest rumblings and ruminations about Oracle > > potentially no longer selling entitlements for Solaris 10 on non-Sun > > hardware -- and then turning around and no longer allowing you to run > > Solaris 10 "freely", we're left with either OpenSolaris or looking at > > Linux again (we run Solaris 10 on Silicon Mechanics hardware). > > Is there some problem with OpenSolaris or NexentaStor? > Maybe not, but am trying to see what options there are on the Linux side. The "delayed allocation" features in ext4 (and xfs, reiser4) sound interesting. Might give a little performance boost for synchronous write workloads.... [ We like Nexenta and OpenSolaris just fine, but really like the stability guarantee Solaris gives us -- much like RHEL. Would rather not have to worry (as much) about needing to reboot storage boxes and even though I have confidence in OpenSolaris, it's still more of a moving / changing target. Not to say we won't ultimately go in that direction though. ] Thanks, Ray