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Bcachefs is probably the only thing that will get there. The codebase is clean and we'll mantained, built from solid technology (bcache) and will include most o

Bcachefs is probably the only thing that will get there. The codebase is clean and we'll mantained, built from solid technology (bcache) and will include most of the ZFS niceties. I just wish more companies would sponsor de project and stop wasting money on BTRFS

jessant 7y ago
Snapshots don't seem to be done yet.
- fgonzag 7y ago
  That's exactly why I said it's probably the only one that will get there.
  - Rapzid 7y ago
    Heh, BTRFS deja vu. Been hearing about the ZFS alternative "not quite there, but catching up" for about as long as high-speed rail. I wonder which will arrive first :)
    - fgonzag 7y ago
      BTRFS is never going to become stable. Ever. Just take a quick dive into the codebase. Bcachefs has never had an unrecoverable data error AFAIK, even though it isn't even considered stable enough to merge into the kernel. The bcache on disk format won't be considered stable until he merges his code into mainline, though he doesn't feel he will need to adjust it further. Features that currently work: Full data checksumming Compression Multiple device support Tiering/writeback caching RAID1/RAID10 All of these are stable, tested, and mostly bug free. Honestly, once the code gets mainlined you'll be able to start using it very quickly. Main issue right now is performance, as it about as slow as BTRFS, which isn't inspiring. However the author has stated that he's going for correctness first, then he'll begin optimizing.
- aseipp 7y ago
  Kent has admitted (many times) that snapshots are one of the more difficult features to add in a reliable and safe way, and will require significant work to do right, especially for what he wants to see them do (I assume "really damn fast and low overhead" is a major one, plus some other tricks he has up his sleeve.) So he has intentionally not tackled them yet, instead going after a slew of other features first. Reflink, full checksum, replication, caching, compression, native encryption, etc. All of that works today. Snapshots are a huge feature for sure, but it's not like bcachefs is completely incapable without them. There was a very recent update he gave in late December (2019) that mentioned he's actively chipping away at the roadblocks for snapshots.
- ZoomZoomZoom 7y ago
  They're being worked on ATM: Dec 29, 2019 "Just finished a major rework that gets us a step closer to snapshots: the btree code is incrementally being changed to handle extents like regular keys." https://www.patreon.com/posts/towards-32698961 https://www.patreon.com/posts/towards-32698961
reacharavindh 7y ago
Yes, I’m eagerly waiting for Bcachefs to get there at some point, but it is several years away (rightly so, because it is hard and the developer is doing an amazing job) if my understanding of its state is correct. I have heard of durability issues with btrfs, and do not want to touch it if it fails with its primary job.
lifty 7y ago
I’m looking forward to bcachefs becoming feature complete and upstreamed. We finally have a good chance of having a modern and reliable FS in the Linux kernel. My wish list includes snapshots and per volume encryption.
donmcronald 7y ago
What if the main purpose of BTRFS is to have something "good enough" so no one starts working on a project that can compete with large commercial storage offerings? Does anyone remember the parity patches they rejected in 2014? > Your work is very very good, it just doesn’t fit our business case. I haven't followed it much. Does it have anything more than mirroring (that's stable) these days?
forgotpwd16 7y ago
>stop wasting money on BTRFS You're saying they should stop supporting a project that was considered stable by the time the other started being developed. Why do that? What makes Bcachefs a better choice?
- fgonzag 7y ago
  Take a cursory look into both codebases, the stability of the every feature at launch and on maintenance. It's not hard to see BTRFS is a doomed project. Bcachefs is more like PostgreSQL, the developer doesn't add features until he has a solid design that's well thought out. Hence why he hasn't implemented snapshots. I don't think too many people consider it stable enough for production, either. (Unless you count a very limited subset of its functionality). I rather run Bcachefs today than Btrfs, by a mile. At least with bcachefs I won't lose my data.
  - phire 7y ago
    If you are on BTRFS and you encounter an unrecoverable bug (which seems to be reasonably common), the developers will most likely recommend you wipe the drive and restore from backups (because you had backups, right?) Even if the data is still on the drive and a bugfix would make the filesystem recoverable again, they don't have the time/knowledge/resources to untangle that codebase and make fixes. Even BTRFS developers don't trust the filesystem with their own data. If you are on Bcachefs and you encounter an unrecoverable bug, the developer will ask for some logs, or reproduction steps, or potentially even remote debugging access to your corrupt filesystem. And then he will fix the bug, releasing a new version that can read/repair your filesystem. He knows his codebase like the back of hand. In my research, I couldn't find any examples of someone actually losing data due to Bcachefs. All the bugs appeared to be "data has been written to drive, but bug prevented reading" While I would still hesitate to trust Bcachefs, I would trust it way more than BTRFS.
    - XorNot 7y ago
      Just want to note that bcachefs looks great (I was sort of tangentially aware but hadn't dedicated significant attention to it). Definitely something to try out (backing up my home servers is just about to reach viability for me, so I'd definitely consider switching to it in that use case). Thanks!
XorNot 7y ago
Which is why ZFS is still a thing today - there are no other alternatives. Everything is coming "soon" while ZFS is actually here and clocking up a stability track-record.
ksec 7y ago
>Bcachefs is probably the only thing that will get there. Or Bcachefs is probably the only thing that might get there. The amount of engineering hours went into ZFS is insane. It is easy to get a project that has 80% similarity on the surface, but then you spend the same amount of time from 0 - 80% on the last 20% and edge cases. ZFS has been battle tested by many. Rsync is on ZFS. The amount of Petabyte stored in ZFS safely over the years gives peace of mind. Speaking of Rsync, normally a topic of ZFS on HN will have him resurface. Hasn't seen any reply from him yet.

jessant 7y ago

Snapshots don't seem to be done yet.

fgonzag 7y ago
That's exactly why I said it's probably the only one that will get there.
- Rapzid 7y ago
  Heh, BTRFS deja vu. Been hearing about the ZFS alternative "not quite there, but catching up" for about as long as high-speed rail. I wonder which will arrive first :)
  - fgonzag 7y ago
    BTRFS is never going to become stable. Ever. Just take a quick dive into the codebase. Bcachefs has never had an unrecoverable data error AFAIK, even though it isn't even considered stable enough to merge into the kernel. The bcache on disk format won't be considered stable until he merges his code into mainline, though he doesn't feel he will need to adjust it further. Features that currently work: Full data checksumming Compression Multiple device support Tiering/writeback caching RAID1/RAID10 All of these are stable, tested, and mostly bug free. Honestly, once the code gets mainlined you'll be able to start using it very quickly. Main issue right now is performance, as it about as slow as BTRFS, which isn't inspiring. However the author has stated that he's going for correctness first, then he'll begin optimizing.
aseipp 7y ago
Kent has admitted (many times) that snapshots are one of the more difficult features to add in a reliable and safe way, and will require significant work to do right, especially for what he wants to see them do (I assume "really damn fast and low overhead" is a major one, plus some other tricks he has up his sleeve.) So he has intentionally not tackled them yet, instead going after a slew of other features first. Reflink, full checksum, replication, caching, compression, native encryption, etc. All of that works today. Snapshots are a huge feature for sure, but it's not like bcachefs is completely incapable without them. There was a very recent update he gave in late December (2019) that mentioned he's actively chipping away at the roadblocks for snapshots.
ZoomZoomZoom 7y ago
They're being worked on ATM: Dec 29, 2019 "Just finished a major rework that gets us a step closer to snapshots: the btree code is incrementally being changed to handle extents like regular keys." https://www.patreon.com/posts/towards-32698961 https://www.patreon.com/posts/towards-32698961

reacharavindh 7y ago

Yes, I’m eagerly waiting for Bcachefs to get there at some point, but it is several years away (rightly so, because it is hard and the developer is doing an amazing job) if my understanding of its state is correct. I have heard of durability issues with btrfs, and do not want to touch it if it fails with its primary job.

lifty 7y ago

I’m looking forward to bcachefs becoming feature complete and upstreamed. We finally have a good chance of having a modern and reliable FS in the Linux kernel. My wish list includes snapshots and per volume encryption.

donmcronald 7y ago

What if the main purpose of BTRFS is to have something "good enough" so no one starts working on a project that can compete with large commercial storage offerings? Does anyone remember the parity patches they rejected in 2014? > Your work is very very good, it just doesn’t fit our business case. I haven't followed it much. Does it have anything more than mirroring (that's stable) these days?

forgotpwd16 7y ago

>stop wasting money on BTRFS You're saying they should stop supporting a project that was considered stable by the time the other started being developed. Why do that? What makes Bcachefs a better choice?

fgonzag 7y ago
Take a cursory look into both codebases, the stability of the every feature at launch and on maintenance. It's not hard to see BTRFS is a doomed project. Bcachefs is more like PostgreSQL, the developer doesn't add features until he has a solid design that's well thought out. Hence why he hasn't implemented snapshots. I don't think too many people consider it stable enough for production, either. (Unless you count a very limited subset of its functionality). I rather run Bcachefs today than Btrfs, by a mile. At least with bcachefs I won't lose my data.
- phire 7y ago
  If you are on BTRFS and you encounter an unrecoverable bug (which seems to be reasonably common), the developers will most likely recommend you wipe the drive and restore from backups (because you had backups, right?) Even if the data is still on the drive and a bugfix would make the filesystem recoverable again, they don't have the time/knowledge/resources to untangle that codebase and make fixes. Even BTRFS developers don't trust the filesystem with their own data. If you are on Bcachefs and you encounter an unrecoverable bug, the developer will ask for some logs, or reproduction steps, or potentially even remote debugging access to your corrupt filesystem. And then he will fix the bug, releasing a new version that can read/repair your filesystem. He knows his codebase like the back of hand. In my research, I couldn't find any examples of someone actually losing data due to Bcachefs. All the bugs appeared to be "data has been written to drive, but bug prevented reading" While I would still hesitate to trust Bcachefs, I would trust it way more than BTRFS.
  - XorNot 7y ago
    Just want to note that bcachefs looks great (I was sort of tangentially aware but hadn't dedicated significant attention to it). Definitely something to try out (backing up my home servers is just about to reach viability for me, so I'd definitely consider switching to it in that use case). Thanks!

XorNot 7y ago

Which is why ZFS is still a thing today - there are no other alternatives. Everything is coming "soon" while ZFS is actually here and clocking up a stability track-record.

ksec 7y ago

>Bcachefs is probably the only thing that will get there. Or Bcachefs is probably the only thing that might get there. The amount of engineering hours went into ZFS is insane. It is easy to get a project that has 80% similarity on the surface, but then you spend the same amount of time from 0 - 80% on the last 20% and edge cases. ZFS has been battle tested by many. Rsync is on ZFS. The amount of Petabyte stored in ZFS safely over the years gives peace of mind. Speaking of Rsync, normally a topic of ZFS on HN will have him resurface. Hasn't seen any reply from him yet.