linux-kernel - Re: [PATCH 0/7] overlay filesystem: request for inclusion

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Date:	Fri, 10 Jun 2011 13:51:27 +0200
From:	Bernd Schubert <bernd.schubert@...m.fraunhofer.de>
To:	Andrew Morton <akpm@...ux-foundation.org>
CC:	Andy Whitcroft <apw@...onical.com>, NeilBrown <neilb@...e.de>,
	Miklos Szeredi <miklos@...redi.hu>, viro@...IV.linux.org.uk,
	torvalds@...ux-foundation.org, linux-fsdevel@...r.kernel.org,
	linux-kernel@...r.kernel.org, nbd@...nwrt.org, hramrach@...trum.cz,
	jordipujolp@...il.com, ezk@....cs.sunysb.edu, mszeredi@...e.cz
Subject: Re: [PATCH 0/7] overlay filesystem: request for inclusion

On 06/09/2011 09:32 PM, Andrew Morton wrote:
> On Thu, 9 Jun 2011 14:49:47 +0100
> Andy Whitcroft<apw@...onical.com>  wrote:
>
>> On Wed, Jun 08, 2011 at 08:52:33PM -0700, Andrew Morton wrote:
>>
>> The problem with the userspace alternative is that it does not work. I
>> tried to run my live CD on top of unionfs-fuse and the filesystem
>> would fail intermittently leading to random errors during boot.
>
>
> If the implementation is slow or buggy then the appropriate action is
> to speed it up and to fix the bugs, so these are just non-arguments,
> IMO.

Exactly. It is rather sad that people never bothered to file bug reports 
about slow performance issues. I'm one of the upstream authors of 
unionfs-fuse and also use it on my own for live-USB sticks and 
NFS-booted systems and do not have such problems.

>
> If it is demonstrated that the userspace implementation simply cannot
> ever have acceptable performance then OK, we have an argument for a
> kernel driver.

Well, I know rather well were most of the performance issues in 
unionfs-fuse come from (at least the normal issues, not those above 
where it seems to fail at all). And those issues are mostly unrelated to 
user-space, but just due to very simple approaches to get a working 
union implementation at all (neither kernel solution actually does what 
I need...). The main problem is that I barely find spare time to further 
improve unionfs-fuse...

Another real difficulty with user-space implementations are init scripts 
- while it works perfectly with Debian, I always have the feeling that 
RedHat does everything they to make it impossible to use fuse as root 
file system (eventually I always get it working, till the next minor 
release, which breaks all workarounds again).

Anyway, given my lack of time and the resulting slow development of 
unionfs-fuse, distros probably need another solution for their live CDs.

Cheers,
Bernd

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