Gfarm file system

Gfarm file system is a next-generation network shared file system.

Gfarm file system will be an alternative solution of NFS, and will meet a demand for much larger, much reliable, and much faster file system.

What is new in this release:

• This version adds an automatic replica creation feature (replica_check), an IO statistics monitoring feature (config-gfmd-iostat, config-gfsd-iostat), a ganglia plugin, and improvements to tools to maintain replica location (gfncopy, gfprep, gfpcopy, etc). Stability under high load conditions is improved, as well. gfarm2fs 1.2.9, gfarm samba plugin 1.0.0, and gfarm zabbix plugin 1.1.0 are also released.

What is new in version 2.5.1:

• This version includes bugfixes for replicated metadata servers.
• Upgrading is recommended.

What is new in version 2.4.2:

• New Feature:
• extended Access Control List (ACL) based on POSIX 1003.1e DRAFT 17
• gfarm_root.{user,group} extended attributes to specify root privileged users
• support of a symbolic link in Gfarm URL format to federate Gfarm
• file systems
• New Command:
• gfsetfacl, gfgetfacl - managing extended ACLs
• New API:
• Gfarm ACL APIs - gfs_acl_*
• gfs_lgetxattr, gfs_lsetxattr, gfs_lremovexattr, gfs_llistxattr, gfs_lgetxmlattr, gfs_lsetxmlattr, gfs_lremovexmlattr, gfs_llistxmlattr
• gfs_lchown, gfs_lchmod, gfs_lutimes - operations that do not follow a symlink
• Documentation:
• manual pages - gfexport(1), gfreg(1) gfquota(1), gfedquota(1), gfquotacheck(1), gfusage(1) - managing quota gfgetfacl(1), gfsetfacl(1) - managing extended ACLs gfarm_attr(5) - extended attribute
• SETUP - new basic functionality section
• Performance improvement:
• latency improvement in a recursive operation of gfarm commands
• Updated feature:
• gfchmod, gfchown - -h option not to follow a symlink, and wildcard expansion
• config-gfarm - support Ubuntu 10.10
• namespace of extended attribute - see gfarm_attr(5)
• gfrm - -r and -n options
• Bug fix:
• libgfarm APIs do not follow symlinks [sf.net trac #185]
• gfsd does not work on NetBSD-5 [sf.net trac #208]
• error detection problem of gfmkdir -p [sf.net trac #218]
• missing sanity check when moving a directory to its descendant [sf.net trac #198]
• when a directory is moved, its ".." link is not maintained correctly [sf.net trac #182]
• struct gfs_stat:st_nlink for directories is not maintained correctly [sf.net trac #199]
• minimum disk space is not correctly handled by gfrep [sf.net trac
• #195]
• signal handlers don't work on CentOS 5.5 [sf.net trac #192]

What is new in version 2.4.1:

• This release adds several new features like automatic replication, extended attribute caching, known_network directive to specify the network structure of data nodes, among several bug fixes and performance improvements.

What is new in version 2.2.0:

• New Features:
• symbolic link support
• hundreds of clients support by thread pool
• directory listing speedup by attribute cache New Command
• gfstatus - display Gfarm configuration status
• gfln - create a hard link or a symbolic link New Admin Command
• config-gfarm-update - update the backend database. 'config-gfarm-update --update-symlink' updates the backend database to manage symbolic links. Note that the postgresql backend is only supported for now. New API
• gfs_symlink, gfs_readlink - symbolic link support
• gfs_lstat New configuration in gfmd.conf
• metadb_server_stack_size directive to specify a stack size of threads
• metadb_server_thread_pool_size directive to specify the maximum number of threads in a thread pool
• metadb_server_job_queue_length directive to specify the length of a job request queue
• metadb_server_heartbeat_interval directive to specify the interval of heartbeat to each gfsd Documentation
• manual pages - gfchgrp(1), gfchmod(1), gfchown(1), gfgroup(1), gfhost(1), gfln(1), gfls(1), gfmv(1), gfstatus(1), gfuser(1).
• manual pages in HTML Updated feature
• gfls - accomodate attribute caching and support display regarding symlinks and hardlinks
• gfchmod - display more user friendly error message
• gfmd - support hundreds of clients by introducing a thread pool
• gfmd - authorize peers concurrently by making network related functions MT safe
• gfmd - schedule the local host only when it has enough disk space
• gfsd - support gfmd reconnection at the start up
• (GSI) allow to delegate a limited proxy
• (GSI) disable GSS_C_NT_USER_NAME (spool_server_cred_type user) by default since it is not supported by Globus GSI Bug fix
• libgfarm - fix missing intialization of a pointer
• gfmd - fix race condition
• gfsd - fix -c and -cc options to check invalid files not only invalid file replicas
• gfsd - terminate the master process when the back channel process dies
• (GSI) use distinguished name of delegated credential

What is new in version 2.1.1:

• New Feature
• on-demand replication
• New Command
• gfdump.postgresql - gfdump for postgresql backend
• New API
• gfs_link - hardlink support [contribution from Rainer Rohmfeld]
• Documentation
• manual pages - gfrep(1)
• Updated feature
• gfgroup - group membership modification support
• C++ support
• support Globus 4.2.0
• Bug fix
• segfault when listing a directory that includes a removed user [sf.net tracker bugs #2009543]
• race condition during authentication
• LP64 portability problem when using GSI authentication
• "too many open files" problem when replicating many files