File System Design of Linux-based Network Attached Storage Appliance
Yang Gen · Jisuanji gongcheng · 2003
Linux is an ideal OS to develop NAS for its merits such as open source, strong support for hardware, full implementation of many network protocols, etc. But the popular Ext2 file system used in Linux is unfit for NAS. The safety, reliability, storage efficiency, access speed of a file system are critical standards to measure the performance of NAS. Aimed at these objectives, this paper analyses, designs and optimizes the file system of NAS. This paper introduces new methods: to improve the system safety by separating its system files from user files; to make up the shortcomings of ext2 by replacing it with ReiserFS journaling file system; to speed up the access by using RamDisk technology. At the end of the paper, it tests the new system and compares with others. The result shows that new system has better performance.