Ext3 users - Apr 2002 - EXT3: tail packing status / a few questions

Dr. Tweedie, et al.:

	I have decided to move to EXT3 from ReiserFS if I can get tail
packing for EXT3. Last I had asked about it, someone had written some
sort of patch but it was not official (I think), and was questionable if
it had worked or not. Can someone tell me the status in the instant? If
I installed 2.4.18 or a later kernel, would tail packing be part of
EXT3? How would I turn it on or off?

	I also have a couple of other questions:

	a) How can I revert back to EXT2 from EXT3, since Partition
Magic does not know how to resize an EXT3 partition?

	b) Someone had posted a command to adjust the percentage of
"reserve" space that EXT3 sets aside, can someone repost that again?


Very Respectfully, 

Stuart Blake Tener, IT3 (E-4), USNR-R, N3GWG 
Beverly Hills, California
VTU 1904G (Volunteer Training Unit) 
stuart@bh90210.net 
west coast: (310)-358-0202 P.O. Box 16043, Beverly Hills, CA 90209-2043 
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JOIN THE US NAVY RESERVE, SERVE YOUR COUNTRY, AND BENEFIT FROM IT ALL. 

Thursday, April 04, 2002 12:09 PM

On Thu, 2002-04-04 at 22:14, IT3 Stuart Blake Tener, USNR-R
wrote:
> Dr. Tweedie, et al.:
> 
> 	I have decided to move to EXT3 from ReiserFS if I can get tail
> packing for EXT3. Last I had asked about it, someone had written some
> sort of patch but it was not official (I think), and was questionable if
> it had worked or not. Can someone tell me the status in the instant? If
> I installed 2.4.18 or a later kernel, would tail packing be part of
> EXT3? How would I turn it on or off?
Why is tailpacking so important for you? I'd rather have a stable and
proven filesystem than 5% extra space (that's what it gives me according
to the reiserfs docs)
> 	I also have a couple of other questions:
> 
> 	a) How can I revert back to EXT2 from EXT3, since Partition
> Magic does not know how to resize an EXT3 partition.

The manpage of tune2fs gives me this, I'm sure you know what to do with
it: 

       -O [^]feature[,...]
              Set  or  clear  the  indicated  filesystem features
              (options)  in  the  filesystem.   More   than   one
              filesystem  feature  can be cleared or set by sepa­
              rating features with commas.   Filesystem  features
              prefixed  with  a  caret  character  ('^')  will be
              cleared in the filesystem's superblock;  filesystem
              features  without  a  prefix  character or prefixed
              with a plus character ('+') will be  added  to  the
              filesystem.

              The  following  filesystem  features  can be set or
              cleared using tune2fs:

                   sparse_super
                          Limit the number of backup  superblocks
                          to save space on large filesystems.

                   filetype
                          Store  file  type information in direc­
                          tory entries.

                   has_journal
                          Create an ext3 journal (as if using the
                          -j option).

              After  setting  or clearing any filesystem feature,
              e2fsck(8) must be run on the filesystem  to  return
              the filesystem to a consistent state.

 
> 	b) Someone had posted a command to adjust the percentage of
> "reserve" space that EXT3 sets aside, can someone repost that
again?
Manpages rock! The same manpage that gave me the journal-stuff also
gives me:
       -m reserved-blocks-percentage
              Set the percentage of reserved filesystem blocks.

       -r reserved-blocks-count
              Set the number of reserved filesystem blocks.

Next time when you mail a mailinglist first try google, man, etc. first?
:)

Regards,

Erik Smit