[CentOS] Native ZFS on Linux

[Ray Van Dolson]

On Fri, May 29, 2015 at 07:51:58AM -0700, Chuck Munro wrote:
> I have a question that has been puzzling me for some time ... what
> is the reason RedHat chose to go with btrfs rather than working with
> the ZFS-on-Linux folks (now OpenZFS)?  Is it a licensing issue,
> political, etc?
> 
> Although btrfs is making progress, ZFS is far more mature, has a few
> more stable features (especially Raid-z3) and has worked flawlessly
> for me on CentOS-6 and Scientific Linux-6.  I used ZFS for a couple
> of large file servers with no problems.  The only annoying part was
> having to manually install the kernel module each time a kernel
> update was issued.
> 
> Because FreeBSD has built-in drivers for LSI cards (I use JBOD mode)
> and strong ZFS support, I've switched to FreeNAS with it's default
> native ZFS and driver support for LSI.  I would have preferred to
> stick with CentOS, but FreeNAS just made things easier to manage.
> It also seems about twice as fast as ZFS on Linux (same hardware),
> but that may simply be a tuning issue.
> 
> Is there any chance that a native ZFS (rather than btrfs) will ever
> emerge in RHEL/CentOS?  Just curious, because I'd love to return to
> CentOS/SL next time I build large file servers.
> 
> As an aside, I have used only WD Black and WD RedPro drives for
> RAID, and not had any issues.  Green drives are scary :-)
> 
> Chuck

Licensing, IMO.  Redistributing ZoL is likely fraught with a bit of
legal peril, or at best, technical peril if you want to try and skirt
the legal edges.  Oracle is notoriously litigious and having a target
liked Red Hat would probably have their lawyers whetting their chops.

Ironically, btrfs was also an Oracle thing -- in that Chris Mason
worked for them (believe he's now at Google?).

Do agree that ZFS feels like what btrfs is trying to become.  I use ZoL
on some production boxes and its been quite stable, but am also
considering the approach you've taken with FreeNAS for some larger
deployments to chase after a bit more performance and tighter
integration with the OS...

Ray