Ext3 users - Nov 2001 - EXT3 with 2.2.20 - Is it stable enough for a production server th at is used 24X7?

Hello All,

I have a production server that is running 2.2.20.  This server *has* to be
up 24X7 - what I'm wondering is:  

1)  Is ext3 on 2.2.20 rock stable?  Or, would you recommend that I just stay
with ext2?

2)  I have looked far and wide for a the ext3 patch for 2.2.20 - where can I
find it?

3)  Were are the e2fsprogs that are appropriate to run with the 2.2.X kernel
series?

Thanks,

Wayne

****************************************************

Wayne Willson
Data Network Consultant
AT&T Technical Marketing
Voice:  312.230.4242
Fax:     312.230.8690
Email:   wwillson@att.com

***************************************************

> 1)  Is ext3 on 2.2.20 rock stable?  Or, would you recommend that
> I just stay with ext2?
I'm using ext3 on 2.2.19 for 12 production servers, some of which are under
very heavy load. Uptimes are very good, the best one has been up 138 days
without rebooting. Ext3 works flawlessly. Providing there hasn't been any
major changes between 2.2.19 and 2.2.20 I'd vote for ext3.

Regards,
/Johan Ekenberg - Sweden

Hello,
> I have a production server that is running 2.2.20.  This server *has* to be
Me too...
> 1)  Is ext3 on 2.2.20 rock stable?  Or, would you recommend that I just
stay
> with ext2?
It has been running for 4 days on my server and a week on my workstation.
And much longer than that on earlier kernels, of course.  Haven't had any
problem related to this for 6 months.  (Any reproducible one for 15 months.)

However, there has been an Oops report earlier today.  But I'm no expert.

By the way, wasn't there a couple of issues still open?  Wasn't a 0.0.7b
scheduled some time ago?  I'm thinking of e.g.:
http://www.redhat.com/mailing-lists/ext3-users/msg00763.html
http://www.redhat.com/mailing-lists/ext3-users/msg00781.html
> 2)  I have looked far and wide for a the ext3 patch for 2.2.20 - where can
I
> find it?
I asked about the same last week.  The patch for 2.2.19, version 0.0.7a,
looks all right, and can be found at:
ftp://ftp.uk.kernel.org/pub/linux/kernel/people/sct/ext3/

Oh, I forgot, thanks to those who replied to me...
> 3)  Were are the e2fsprogs that are appropriate to run with the 2.2.X
kernel
> series?
Try version 1.25: http://sourceforge.net/projects/e2fsprogs

						Good luck,
						Cedric Ware.

I've tried ext3 0.0.7a applied to Red Hat errata 2.2.19.

Every time I run bonnie it starts killing processes as seen here:
https://listman.redhat.com/pipermail/ext3-users/2001-July/000964.html
I was told that 2.2.x VM needs some adjustements to handle journaling:
https://listman.redhat.com/pipermail/ext3-users/2001-August/001002.html

Is it just me having this kind of problems? Or maybe Red Hat errata has
some patch that clashes with ext3?
I don't see anything in the 2.2.20 changelog that could solve my
problems.
This machine has 64MB mem.

-- 
giulioo@pobox.com

On Nov 16, 2001  08:10 +0100, Giulio Orsero wrote:
> On Thu, 15 Nov 2001 13:25:52 -0700, you wrote:
> >You can check the size with:
> >debugfs <dev>
> >debugfs> stats      (will tell you the journal inode number,
probably 8)
> >...
> It was 32MB, I set it to 4MB.
> I made 4 consecutive bonnie runs with -s 128 and all was ok for the 1st
> time, even if sometime mem was very low (vmstat displayed about 500k for
> 10/15sec).
> 
> Since I have 8 fs on this system, if I enable a 4MB journal on all of them
> and mount them all as ext3, will I have the same problem as with 1 fs with
1
> 32MB journal?
Only if you are running bonnie on all of them at the same time.  Normally
ext3 will only hold (at most) 5 seconds of _metadata_ changes to your
filesystems in memory.  That will normally not even be close to filling
the journal.

Probably in 2.5, there will be changes to allow the VM to tell the
journal to free up some memory when it is running low.

Cheers, Andreas
--
Andreas Dilger
http://sourceforge.net/projects/ext2resize/
http://www-mddsp.enel.ucalgary.ca/People/adilger/