On Thu, Jul 06, 2006 at 12:35:51PM +0200, Pablo Mar?n Ram?n wrote: > > I've been trying to find out whether to enable soft updates or not, and > > I have not really seen any reason not to, other than that it is not > > enabled by default. > > Pros: > * Improved performance
there are known scenarios where it does degrades performance. > * Faster recovery latency after a crash this is just not true at all. > * Can handle a security problem that can occur (AFAIK) in bare FFS > (see http://archives.neohapsis.com/archives/openbsd/2006-06/1045.html) > > Cons: > * Less tested than bare FFS > * More complex than bare FFS > * Disk space is not immediately released (problematic during ugrades) > > I think the "disabled by default" solution is fine: if a user > knows what he's doing (i.e. knows the pros and cons) he can > enable them manually, disabling them on upgrades or other > circumstances if required. By default, a well tested and less > complex FS, with the default BSD semantics (for example, > synchronous directory metadata updates, expected by programs like > some MTAs) is provided. > > The solution adopted by other systems, such as FreeBSD, is to > enable them on all non-root partitions. > > PS: A note in the FAQ saying that all the previous concerns are > meaningless if an IDE HD write cache is enabled would be nice. > -- paranoic mickey (my employers have changed but, the name has remained)
