On Wed, 2015-12-09 at 23:26 +0100, Michelle Sullivan wrote:> Jan Bramkamp wrote: > > On 09/12/15 13:45, Michelle Sullivan wrote: > > > > > > No that will just hide it (if successful at all) and it won't > > > work in > > > all cases. > > > > > > ... i386 is even worse for similar (not the same) instability > > > triggered > > > by the same scripts ... because zfs should not be used with the > > > stock > > > i386 kernel (which means if you're using it the whole patching > > > process > > > with freebsd-update won't work or will 'undo' your kernel > > > config.) > > > > Do you have a good idea how to prevent users from shooting > > themselves > > in the foot by running ZFS on 32 Bit kernels? > > Yes default not to having zfs available on any platform and allow > people > that know what they are doing to turn it on....??I mean "prevent > users > from shooting themselves in the foot" - how about by not having an > option to install a zfs root on the default install disks? > > > > > > Personally I think zfs should be optional only for 'advanced' > > > users and > > > come with a whole host of warnings about what it is not suitable > > > for.... > > > however, it seems to be treated as a magic bullet for data > > > corruption > > > issues yet all I have seen is an ever growing list of where it > > > causes > > > problems.. when did UFS become an unreliable FS that is > > > susceptible to > > > chronic data corruption? > > > > As storage capacity grew a lot faster than reliability. > > Yeah, that's why we have these multi-tes-of-terrabyte laptops that > must > have a zfs root install... > > > > > UFS is a good file system for its time, but it trusts hardware > > absolutely. Modern hardware doesn't deserve this level of trust. > > Ok at this point we have to question things... > > Does your average home machine need zfs???(because windows doesn't) > ... > does your average laptop require zfs (or even benefit) ...????In fact > when I look at it, I'm running??70+ servers and a few desktops and > I'm > running 5 of them with zfs...??2 of them absolutely need it, 2 of > them > are solaris (which probably doesn't count and certainly doesn't have > relevance to FreeBSD) the other is a 2005 P4 based server that is > completely unusable because zfs on i386 doesn't work with the stock > kernel....??and guess what ... it has 73G 15k SCSI Server drives in > it > so it probably has reliable hardware that doesn't suffer from "Modern > hardware doesn't deserve this level of trust" > > > ZFS detects and recovers without dataloss from most errors caused > > by > > the limited hardware reliability. > > Currently I've had more problems with the reliability of zfs in > FreeBSD > than reliability of hardware..??I do get your point though... > > > > > ZFS isn't just a tool to deal with hardware limitations it's also a > > convenience I no longer want to give up. Snapshots and replication > > streams simplify backups and a background scrub once a week (or > > month) > > sure beats waiting for fsck. > Now this is the one set of reasons I can really appreciate and had it > been the opening argument I'd have understood your position, but it > seems this is a side note to the above and the above is where I see > it's > completely useless...??When ZFS was first developed a friend and I in > Sun had lots of fun setting up servers where we just chucked any old > drives we could lay our hands on into a pool ... this we found very > cool > and this was where 'unreliable' hardware was an understatement - the > drives were pulled from machines because SMART (and other tools) were > reporting the drive(s) failing..... but it was a work around for bad > sectors etc... > > Seriously though the default to install with zfs and root on zfs is a > really bad idea - the people who know how not to shoot themselves in > the > foot are those people that don't need a selectable option in the > install > because they know how to configure it... they're the people who will > probably be in every manual and advanced option they can find anyhow > (or > just using boot servers and predefined install scripts)....!! > > Regards, >I sorry, but I really don't get your point, PCBSD has shown a great reason why zfs on root and on laptops/desktops is a good idea... boot environments. They have pretty much figured out how to use snapshots to go from A-B ping-pong installations to A-B-C-D-E.... installations. I am even aware of people using it to run Release and Current on the same machine. Unfortunately at the moment the system requires GRUB, but there is ongoing work to add the ability to the FreeBSD bootloader. Further IIRC zfs send-receive has a history involving a developer who wanted a better rsync for transfering his work to a laptop. In addition we have pretty much Moore's Lawed our way to the point where a new laptop today can out spec a typical server from when ZFS was first implemented. Hiding features because you 'can' shoot your foot off is hardly a typical UNIXy way of thinking anyway. -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: smime.p7s Type: application/x-pkcs7-signature Size: 5729 bytes Desc: not available URL: <http://lists.freebsd.org/pipermail/freebsd-stable/attachments/20151209/0b5553ce/attachment.bin>
On 12/9/2015 17:29, Michael B. Eichorn wrote:> I sorry, but I really don't get your point, PCBSD has shown a great > reason why zfs on root and on laptops/desktops is a good idea... boot > environments. They have pretty much figured out how to use snapshots > to go from A-B ping-pong installations to A-B-C-D-E.... installations. > I am even aware of people using it to run Release and Current on the > same machine. Unfortunately at the moment the system requires GRUB, > but there is ongoing work to add the ability to the FreeBSD > bootloader. Further IIRC zfs send-receive has a history involving a > developer who wanted a better rsync for transfering his work to a > laptop. In addition we have pretty much Moore's Lawed our way to the > point where a new laptop today can out spec a typical server from when > ZFS was first implemented. Hiding features because you 'can' shoot > your foot off is hardly a typical UNIXy way of thinking anyway.Boot environments work fine on FreeBSD. Look at "beadm" :-) What are you trying to do that you need GRUB? -- Karl Denninger karl at denninger.net <mailto:karl at denninger.net> /The Market Ticker/ /[S/MIME encrypted email preferred]/ -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: smime.p7s Type: application/pkcs7-signature Size: 2996 bytes Desc: S/MIME Cryptographic Signature URL: <http://lists.freebsd.org/pipermail/freebsd-stable/attachments/20151209/f4e6151f/attachment.bin>
Michael B. Eichorn wrote:> > I sorry, but I really don't get your point, PCBSD has shown a great > reason why zfs on root and on laptops/desktops is a good idea... boot >It has? As this is FreeBSD not PCBSD I must have missed that one...> environments. They have pretty much figured out how to use snapshots to > go from A-B ping-pong installations to A-B-C-D-E.... installations. I > am even aware of people using it to run Release and Current on the same > machine. Unfortunately at the moment the system requires GRUB, but > there is ongoing work to add the ability to the FreeBSD bootloader. >But it's not there yet... and would you consider this for someone who is not that technical? (Not that technical != non technical)> Further IIRC zfs send-receive has a history involving a developer who > wanted a better rsync for transfering his work to a laptop.As I said previously these are the features are the ones you listed as 'additional' (ie your after thoughts)> In addition > we have pretty much Moore's Lawed our way to the point where a new > laptop today can out spec a typical server from when ZFS was first > implemented. >I have yet to see a 6 spindle laptop... in fact I've yet to see a 3+ spindle laptop... I could be recalling wrongly but I'm pretty sure a number of emails have been seen on @freebsd.org lists that say, "don't use zfs on single spindle machines".. what I do know is that personally I have a machine with a hardware RAID and 16 drives... Initially I configured it with 1 large LD RAID6+HSP and put zfs on it (because I wanted to take advantage of the 'on the fly compression')... it's a backup store... and every scrub checksum errors were found - on files that had not been written to since the last scrub. I reconfigured it as 16 x single disk RAID0 drives - identical hardware, just a different config, put raidz2 across 15 drives and left one as a spare and now I don't have any errors except when a drive fails and even then it 'self heals'...> Hiding features because you 'can' shoot your foot off is hardly a > typical UNIXy way of thinking anyway.Not talking about 'hiding' features, even though this thread started with someone suggesting 'hiding' a bug by using -J and -j options for cron....! Look I'm being quite confrontational here in this message, there are a lot of people that don't like me here, and I don't like some of them myself so the feeling is very mutual, the point I'm trying to make is quite simple. I see it almost daily, FreeBSD people saying "install ZFS that'll solve your problems" and "ZFS it's the way forward" ... just the same way as they did with PkgNG etc... (not going to say anything on that, don't want an argument on that, this is not about 'that'..) ZFS has it's place, it is very good at some things, it brings features that people need. ZFS does not work (is not stable) on i386 without recompiling the kernel, but it is presented as an installation option. ZFS is compiled in by default in i386 kernels without the necessary option change to make it "stable". We have been told the kernel option change will never be put there by default. freebsd-update will remove/replace a kernel compiled with the option i386 is still a teir1 platform. 32bit laptops are still available for purchase at major retailers (eg: Bestbuy) I do not believe zfs should be default available when it is not stable on all teir1 platforms. I believe it should be fixed to be stable before its added as an installation option to teir1 platforms and if it cannot/willnot be fixed to 'stable' status then it should never make it into the defaults available... it should be limited to be in advanced installations where the people who know will probably know how to fix things or what to expect. ..anyhow my thoughts on the subject.. why I don't know because in the time it has taken me to write this, it occurred to me, I don't give a stuff really if people see FreeBSD as stable or unstable anymore. I put forward experiences and what I see and the questions/answers I have to deal with here and am usually ignored or argued with and I spend 30 minutes (or more) writing emails explaining stuff/defending myself to people who don't care and think (like me) they know best when I could actually be doing the work I get paid for. On that note I will leave you to considerand discard my thoughts as trivial and pointless and reply as such and get on with making my stuff better by actually listening to people who use it. -- Michelle Sullivan http://www.mhix.org/