All Questions
27 questions
1vote
0answers
43views
HDD Write Performance: Pre-allocate vs. Append (Inode Impact?)
When writing a large (10GB) file to an HDD, I'm considering two approaches for writing the data: Pre-allocate: Create a 10GB file upfront and then write data sequentially (e.g., using fallocate on ...
0votes
0answers
65views
Inode of a Directory
Can you show with some picture or illustration what does an inode of a directory in ext4 filesystem? Especially, how is the list of directory entries (list of filename-inode pairings) stored?.
- 21
9votes
5answers
4kviews
Why can't hard links reference files on other filesystems?
I'm aware that this article exists: Why are hard links only valid within the same filesystem? But it unfortunately didn't click with me. https://www.kernel.org/doc/html/latest/filesystems/ext4/...
- 543
1vote
1answer
603views
Ext4 "unused inodes" "free inodes" diffrence?
When I use the dumpe2fs command to look at the Block Group of the ext4 filesystem, I see "free inodes" and "unused inodes". I want to know the difference between them ? Why do they ...
- 13
4votes
0answers
445views
How to Open a file in the kernel using only the inode
I am currently trying to open, read, write to a specific file in the (Linux) kernel space. I know that filp_open, kernel_write functions could be used to perform the same effects as open, write in the ...
- 41
4votes
3answers
2kviews
How inodes numbers are assigned
Two known facts: In linux, moving a file from one location to another on the same file system doesn't change the inode (the file remains at "the same place", only the directories involved ...
- 573
2votes
0answers
26views
How Linux system knows what files/subdirectories are under one directory [duplicate]
I'm reading the book "Linux Kernel Development", and there are some important points: inode doesn't include filename. filenames are stored in directory entry(dentry). but dentry is not ...
- 121
0votes
1answer
155views
Contents of an inode
Is there a command that lists all the information contained in an Inode of a file/directory? Such as User ID of file, Group ID of file, Device ID, File size, Date of creation, Permission, Owner of the ...
-2votes
1answer
2kviews
What is the difference between "dentry" and "inode table" in Linux FS? [duplicate]
Are dentries and inode table same thing? If not what is the purpose of each and where are they stored? How does the filesystem exactly work specifically "ext4" or "xfs"?
2votes
0answers
305views
Does the Linux Page Cache (Buffer Cache) only cache the files' clusters (pages) or does it also cache the Inodes (metadata)?
The Linux-Kernel implements a Page Cache (often also called Buffer Cache) to speed up the file systems of the underlying storage devices. Does the Page Cache only cache the pages or clusters of files ...
- 485
1vote
1answer
1kviews
Why does a file's Inode number change and nothing else?
Today I noticed that tripwire thinks that some Apache configuration files changed yesterday. I know I did not make any changes to those files. Looking at the info, it shows that only the Inode number ...
- 3,075
3votes
2answers
3kviews
How do inode numbers from ls -i relate to inodes on disk
I'm trying to understand how inode numbers (as displayed by ls -i) work with ext4 partitions. I'm trying to understand whether they are a construct of the linux kernel and mapped to inodes on disk, ...
- 20.1k
1vote
2answers
2kviews
File system Inode flags: difference between FS_IOC_GETFLAGS and FS_IOC_FSGETXATTR
What is the difference between FS_IOC_GETFLAGS and FS_IOC_FSGETXATTR ioctl commands? What flags do both return?
3votes
1answer
962views
"ls" command showing inode numbers for an NTFS partition
I have an NTFS partition mounted at /media/disk. I run the following command: ls -lai /media/disk, and I got the following result: The first column is for the inode number. But why is the inode ...
33votes
2answers
5kviews
Why do the directories /home, /usr, /var, etc. all have the same inode number (2)?
I find that under my root directory, there are some directories that have the same inode number: $ ls -aid */ .*/ 2 home/ 2 tmp/ 2 usr/ 2 var/ 2 ./ 2 ../ 1 sys/ 1 proc/ I only know that the ...
- 345
