Partition limitations

Nr18 · 07-18-2006, 03:39 AM

Hi,

I have a EXT3 partition with a resource directory and in that directory ar a lot of file's and it's groing each and every day.

Now is my question is there a limit on linux partitions like you can only store x amount of files in one directory?

Thanx,

Nr18

Okie · 07-18-2006, 03:49 AM

i think ext3 can handle that just fine, i think there is a limit on file size (large single files) there is a new version of the extended file system in the works (ext4) that makes handleing files better.

i have some accounting software and instead of letting the database file get too large i made 12 directories (folders) and named them for each month of the year and every month i put the database file in its correct directory and start a new one, next year i will make another 12 and put them in another directory named 2007, another benefit is the software i use runs better without having a huge single file to deal with.

Nr18 · 07-18-2006, 04:37 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Okie

i think ext3 can handle that just fine, i think there is a limit on file size (large single files) there is a new version of the extended file system in the works (ext4) that makes handleing files better.

i have some accounting software and instead of letting the database file get too large i made 12 directories (folders) and named them for each month of the year and every month i put the database file in its correct directory and start a new one, next year i will make another 12 and put them in another directory named 2007, another benefit is the software i use runs better without having a huge single file to deal with.

Thanx Okie,

i've only got file's of 2 a 3 mb so the size won't be the problem. i'm worried about the amount of file's in a single directory but by your reaction i think that won't be the problem!

https://www.redhat.com/archives/ext3.../msg00227.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ext3

For the people how want to now more

jf.vdbosch · 07-18-2006, 05:06 AM

You should look up the amount of free nodes on the partition.

df -i /target

That (besides diskspace) limits the amount of files that can be created on a partition.

Regards, Hans.

Nr18 · 07-18-2006, 06:18 AM

I've got this:

Code:

Filesystem            Inodes   IUsed   IFree IUse% Mounted on
/dev/md2             14745600  368537 14377063    3% /

so how many file's can i store then? and is this for your total os? or is it for one directory?

michapma · 07-18-2006, 07:16 AM

If it lists the amount of free inodes for the partition, then presumably the limitation will be for the partition. Note that the number of inodes limits the number of directories and files together. This seems unimportant in your case though since you seem to have far more files than directories.

The implication seems to be that you can have an unlimited number of files in a directory. There may be practical limits, though.

Quote:

> (9) In designing new systems, are there some useful guidelines
> about the maximum number of files that can exist in a single
> directory without significant performance loss?
> I am interested in ext2, ext3, and htree.

Non-htree gets awkward at a few thousand. htree appears to be OK up to
hundreds of thousands. Its practical scalability is unknown, really.

https://www.redhat.com/archives/ext3.../msg00061.html

I'm sure Google can tell you more.

The Wikipedia footnote says:

Quote:

The maximum number of inodes (and hence the maximum number of files and directories) is set when the file system is created. If V is the volume size in blocks, then the default number of inodes is given by V/2^{13}, and the minimum by V/2^{23}. The default was deemed sufficient for most applications.

By default your system would therefore have V/2^{13}, implying that you have a volume size of 14745600 * 2^{13} = 120,795,955,200 blocks. That seems like rather a lot.

jf.vdbosch · 07-19-2006, 07:12 AM

The number of inodes is determined when you create a filesystem on a partition.
inodes are used for files and directories (which are also files).
Thus the amount of inodes applies to the entire partition.

If you are planning on using large numbers of files, why not use reiserfs?
It is said that reiserfs is faster when it comes to large numbers of files.

Regards, Hans.