ext3 vs vxfs major filesystem size differences
 

Hi All,

We have 3 RH5u4-64 servers. Server 1 is a standalone server. Servers 2 & 3 are clustered filesystem servers running Veritas CFS 5.0mp3.

Server 1's filesystem is EXT3 and was cloned from a Sun server running Veritas 5.0mp3-VXFS. Filesystem size returned from 'du' 'df' show about 428GB on both the Linux Standalone Server(EXT3) & the Sun Solaris Servers (vxfs).

We then cloned Server 1's filesystem (EXT3) to the 2-node CFS servers. Cloning was successful, but the filesystem sizes returned by 'du' 'df' show 128GB. Block Size for the EXT3 filesystem is 4k while blocksize for the VXFS filesystem is 1k.

Where did that other 300GB go?

I can see VXFS/CFS being slightly more efficient than EXT3 because it's been around much longer, but that can't possibly account for the vast difference.

Any ideas, anyone?

Depends what you call "cloning" - what was the procedure ?. In detail.

Well, here's what I know.

We are running Oracle Web Content Manager (WCM) formerly known as Stellent.

According to the WCM admins, they clone via the application. They are telling me that it's only doing an scp -r -p.

As a test, I want to do the copy outside of the application as the app may be re-orging somehow. I see on the larger one actually has more files, so that probably accounts for part of the discrepancy!

I figure if Solaris 9 Veritas 5.0mp3 -> RH5u4 EXT3 is almost bytewise the same, then there's probably something the app does.

Copy-type tools (like scp) don't affect the size of the filesystem. That is set (i.e. "fixed") when you do the mkfs - and is what "df" shows.
I'd be guessing they have always been different.

It's also entirely possible (not common) to have a f/s smaller than the partition it occupies. That confuses the troops too.

found the problem. The application 'clone tool' skipped 22,000 files for some reason. So, there really isn't any difference in the files that were actually cloned to the new server(s).