Hello slackers I have been looking into f2fs as a installation option cause, I am wanting to create a sorta portable workstation USB.
Does any one know if f2fs is in slackware 14.2 ? or if theirs a build script for the 14.2 branch their is one for 14.1.

IF you want a sorta "portable workstation USB", I suggest you to install Slackware in an external hard drive, using the standard filesystems, i.e. EXT4FS.

Some of those thingies are quite small and any of them would be magnitude grades better to host an operating system.

For example, look in the attached image to a cheap Chinese "KingDian P10 Portable 120GB USB 3.0 To Type C External Solid State Drive SSD", which gives you 320MB/s read and 280MB/s write.

Of course, that will do over USB3, over USB2 you will got max 30MB/s for both read and write...

BTW, you can go even more cheap, with a small mSATA enclosure (see the second image) and some small mSATA hard drive, remained from a laptop ugrade.

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Slackware does not include f2fs tools and I'm not sure if the tools are required to mount an f2fs partition (if you partitioned it on a different computer or with a different OS). If the tools are required, you'd need to build the package and install it to the installation environment before you'd be able to use it. It's also possible the installer has a specific list of partition types it will install to, so that could add more complexity to the installation process.

Another, possibly easier, option than Darth Vader's would be to use Slackware Live. It is an unofficial project by Eric Hameleer's who is one of the core Slackware team members (he also developed what eventually became Slackware64 back when Slackware was only 32bit, so he knows what he's doing ). With his iso2usb.sh script, it can write the contents of the Slackware Live iso to a USB device and optionally enable persistence (the ability for changes to persist between reboots), encryption, or install separate modules providing things like multilib, skype, or wine.

This will likely be much easier than doing a regular install to a USB drive as you'd need to worry about persistence with your devices (make sure the system can still boot if /dev/sda changes to /dev/sdb).

https://docs.slackware.com/slackware:liveslak

As for a build script, there is a SlackBuild for f2fs_tools on SBo for 14.2.

https://slackbuilds.org/repository/1...em/f2fs_tools/

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Thanks for the info on buying a external SSD vader the reason I looking into f2fs is cause i can't afford those sorta thing's at the moment.
I know of Alienbob's work and your right his contributions too Slackware are awesome i was doing my best to avoid live persistence but it looks like this might be my only option although i do have one more question is btrfs or zfs even an option using on a USB ?

Nothing else than their own FAT32 filesystem is proper for those flash drives. I do not enter in details, that was discussed till death in this forum, but an USB flash drive is precisely NOT a SSD.

And if you cannot afford an external SSD drive, probably you can afford an ultra cheap Chinese USB2 2.5" enclosure, where you dump whatever old 2.5" drive recovered from a old laptop.

Even there, in Eastern Europe, an enclosure like this costs like 2 cigarettes packs. Brand new is cheaper than a 8GB flash drive.

https://www.okazii.ro/carcasa-usb-ra...dou-a179828685

To have as comparation about what is worth 25 RON in Romania, to note that one cigarettes pack usually costs around 15-20 RON, depending on brand.

AND, also these thingies can give you also that 30MB/s, while the flash drives (if you are lucky, and use their proper filesystem) may gives you 6MB/s ...

You should be able to format the drive whatever format you want... but if you want to install Slackware using a non-normal filesystem, as long as the bootloader supports it and you load the correct modules into the initrd (or build them into the kernel), I'd imagine you're not limited on what filesystems you can use. But getting it set up would be extra work (especially zfs since it isn't included with Slackware).

Is there a reason you don't want to use Slackware Live with persistence?

Because he wants an "upgradeable" workstation on an USB stick?

You can upgrade Slackware Live. If you do it within the OS using slackpkg, it will take some extra space, but you can update it using Eric's iso2usb.sh script (using the -r or --refresh options) with a new ISO.

Yep. Also, what those looking to install natively a Linux in a flash drive ignore in a gracious way, is that a live system read from flash the files in a compressed form, then the throughput is about 2-3 times higher than from a native filesystem.

WHEN the overall flash drive speed is about 6MB/s with some luck, that matter. Really matter.

Vader points the main reason i am trying to skip out on any Live persistence usage, Looking at blogs and benchmarks from phoronix made f2fs look like a great solution for a USB portable pendrive linux.
Bassmadrigal point's a very good point too is that alienbob's live slack is closely the sorta solution i am looking for, but I argue f2fs seems like a hidden gem of sorts it's either my noobie thinking or my idiosyncrasy making f2fs the next greatest thing since slice bread and this leaves me almost having to distro hop.
But i would like too thank you guys for your input !

Look, I will say again: an USB flash is not a hard drive, and is not purposed to host an operating system, even you use F2FS or other "magic tools" ...

And, anyways today is more cheaper, even in the "second world", to get an 80GB external 2.5" hard drive, than a questionable 16GB flash drive.

And it has plenty of space and is very capable to efficiently host an operating system.

So, I will conclude (harshly) that trying to install an non-live operating system in a flash drive is plain stupid, no offense!

There is an saying: use the right tools for the right job.

Another case to add NAND friendly FS as an option for installing Slackware on , JFFS2, F2FS.

This thread is a bit old, but f2fs-tools are in the main tree of -current since Wed Nov 28 07:25:32 UTC 2018.

Actually, I tried to move my Slackware to an f2fs root yesterday, and I found a problem which may be worthy of noting here.

The problem is that as later as kernel 4.19.67, f2fs still doesn't support extended attributes/posix capabilities.

As far as I am aware, none of the packages of the base Slackware uses xattr, however people who want to install stuff from slackbuilds.org would need to be aware that some packages would not work or would require tuning.

In my case there were (easily noticed) JACK and fbterm. Also, I don't have a separate /var partition, so some of my docker subvolumes also didn't manage to get successfully migrated to the new partition.

I heard that some newer kernels, released somewhere after 5.1 can do xattr on f2fs, but I haven't tried, and we don't have it in -current yet.

If you're on current and want to use f2fs with the "generic" kernel
you will have to include crc32 with f2fs in the initrd as it isn't
done automatically. Without crc32 f2fs will not work at all.

Also fallocate does not produce a usable swap file on f2fs.
You will have to do it the old fashioned way (dd).

fsck also claims that one of my f2fs partitions are corrupted
on every boot. Even if I unmount it, run a manual fsck on it,
and reboot without mounting it before.

You probably don't want to use f2fs for anything serious right now.