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Linux is a family of open source Unix-like operating systems based on the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released on September 17, 1991 by Linus Torvalds. Linux is typically packaged in a Linux distribution (or distro for short).

Distributions include the Linux kernel and supporting system software and libraries, many of which are provided by the GNU Project. Many Linux distributions use the word "Linux" in their name, but the Free Software Foundation uses the name GNU/Linux to emphasize the importance of GNU software, causing some controversy.

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Is it worth switching to BTRFS for the average user? (aussie.zone)

submitted 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

35 comments fedilink hide all child comments

I'm having trouble understanding all the benefits of BTRFS and how they'll apply to me.

Copy on Write and auto-compression seem like they will free up a bit of space.

What other practical benefits will I see from using BTRFS? Are there any noticeable performance benefits?

I use my computer to dual-boot. I don't need snapshots because I have a custom script for a fresh install. I use my PC for gaming and work. I've got an NVMe, two SSD's and one HDD.

Thanks in advance!

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[–] [email protected] -3 points 1 year ago (3 children)

Copy on write is likely to introduce significant performance decreases in cases where large or medium size files have a couple bytes changed. It’s usually recommended to turn CoW off on those files; I found it to be more hassle than it’s worth for a root filesystem. It is still a reasonable file system for file storage that looks more like archival - files land there and seldomly or never change. If you don’t have a specific need in mind though, I wouldn’t bother - in my opinion, it’s not great as a general purpose filesystem.

[–] [email protected] 24 points 1 year ago

Copy on write is likely to introduce significant performance decreases in cases where large or medium size files have a couple bytes changed. It’s usually recommended to turn CoW off on those files

Do you happen to have a source or benchmark for this? My understanding of CoW is that the size of the file does not matter, as BTRFS works with blocks and not files. When a block is changed, it's written to a new location. All the old blocks that are not changed are not written again - this wouldn't even make sense in the context of how BTRFS deduplicates blocks anyway.

So:

10 kB base file
modify 1kB of the content
== 11kB total "used" space, and 1kB of new written blocks.

that old 1kB that is no longer part of the file will eventually be cleaned up if needed, but there's no reason to delete it early.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 year ago

Why would OpenSuse/Fedora choose it as their default filesystem if it was as bad you describe?

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

Thanks for the advice!

How do you define medium or large files? What examples of these exist on root?