helmers Posted December 26, 2002 Share Posted December 26, 2002 ...no. I can tell you, it does fragment. I've read page up and page down about the ext2 filesystem and how great it is, but what it basically boils down to, is that it splits the partition into "clusters", and places a "superblock" in front of every one. What this acomplishes is that files are scattered all over the disk, and thus there is less risk of fragmentation. But! What happens if you do the following: - Create a small file (#1) - Create many (and then I mean so many that the space after file #1 is filled) other files - Update file #1, (like adding 20 8MB files to it) In my experience, it gets fragmented. This was what happened on my /boot partition. There was a lot of files stored there (for GRUB), and my default kernel image. I created a few new kernel images, and then I replaced the original with a new one(there was a new kernel out). The check showed 37% fragmentation. The partition in question was 64MB and formatted with ext2. I know XFS also uses the "grouping" of files into clusters, but dunno how this works with ReiserFS or JFS. My guess is that ReiserFS have potential for fragmentation. I hope someone can comment on this, correct me where I'm wrong, and perhaps suggest solutions to my problems. PS: There is one solution that works in most cases, that is backing up all files, wiping the partition, and restoring them. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dmd3x Posted December 26, 2002 Share Posted December 26, 2002 Maybe the writing of files takes longer. I don't have a problem with that though, just as long as there is a faster read. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
helmers Posted December 28, 2002 Author Share Posted December 28, 2002 Well, the Windows defragmenters do have some nice feats, the XP one arrenges all files used at boot time, with ext2 and the like you risk having a lot of core system files spread all over your disk. I'm just surprised that noone is working on a defragger. It seems everyone wants to tweak the penguin in all other aspects but this one. :unsure: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kjordan2001 Posted December 28, 2002 Share Posted December 28, 2002 I guess they figure (if Linux does even have this problem) that fragmentation is a small problem right now compared to getting the OS more friendly. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
warr Posted December 28, 2002 Share Posted December 28, 2002 I guess they figure (if Linux does even have this problem) that fragmentation is a small problem right now compared to getting the OS more friendly. Linux ext2 file system suffer very little from fragmentattion. so it doesn't need this kind of tools. While FAT32 and NTFS need defragmentation tools, this doesn't apply to Unix/Linux file system. ext2/ext3 file management is much more efficient than NTFS/FAT32, esp for large files. and actually the fsck, or e2fsck has the built-in functionality for defragmentattion for my ext3 file system. (not sure ext2) no need to worry Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rathamon Posted December 30, 2002 Share Posted December 30, 2002 ok, but you havent explained WHY this is the case... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MxxCon Posted December 30, 2002 Share Posted December 30, 2002 there is defrag soft on linux http://www.rpmfind.net//linux/RPM/contrib/....73-5.i386.html as you can see it haven't been updated in a bloody long time.. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dmd3x Posted December 31, 2002 Share Posted December 31, 2002 there is defrag soft on linuxhttp://www.rpmfind.net//linux/RPM/contrib/....73-5.i386.html as you can see it haven't been updated in a bloody long time.. Any idea if its reliable? Or even worth it? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MulletRobZ Posted January 3, 2003 Share Posted January 3, 2003 If your system doesn't slow down on you at all, then it's not necessary! Linux always ran very fast on my machine! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chavo Posted January 3, 2003 Share Posted January 3, 2003 Here is an article that explains why defragmentation for ext2 is unnecesary. It's pretty easy to understand and also the first article I got when I searched for "ext2 fragmentation" on Google. http://sdb.suse.de/en/sdb/html/ext2frag.html Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MulletRobZ Posted January 3, 2003 Share Posted January 3, 2003 Very interesting, man! No wonder why Windows has so muich trouble with using the hard drives at times! :D Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MxxCon Posted January 3, 2003 Share Posted January 3, 2003 hmm.. ok but still according to that method you have files all over the partition...instead of in the begining where it's fastest access Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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