[BBLISA] SunFire 4500: Linux + ZFS/FUSE ?

[Edward Ned Harvey]

> From: bblisa-bounces at bblisa.org [mailto:bblisa-bounces at bblisa.org] On
> Behalf Of Brian McAllister
> 
> I have been gifted with a SunFire 4500 to use as the file server for a
> cluster I'm building.  It is currently running Solaris 10, with a 2-disk
> RAID0 set for the system and a 44+2 disk ZFS/RAID-Z2 set for the rest.  We
> do not have support for Solaris, don't want to pay for it, and management
> is reluctant to run something that's not being updated.

If it's intel-based (not sparc) you can go with openindiana.  It's the open
source spinoff from opensolaris.  It's not being updated as *fast* as
commercial solaris, but it's receiving bugfixes.

If it's sparc-based, I suggest looking at openindiana anyway.  I don't know
if it runs on sparc.

You should never put more than approx 8-10 disks into any raidzN set.
Although it works ... As soon as you need to resilver, you'll be hosed.
With 46 disks in a raidz2 set, you'll probably never finish a resilver.
(Unless it's a new or empty pool.)


> I am not enthused about the current state of the various "native" ports of
> ZFS for Linux.  I have been advised by a colleague that ZFS/FUSE on Linux
> is a viable option from a performance and reliability viewpoint.  My plan
> would be to install to one of the two boot disks (leaving Solaris on the
> other for now as failsafe) and re-use the ZFS pool without alteration.
> 
> Does anyone have experience with this combination ?

I don't have experience with linux & zfs, but I will say this:  Even if
you're running a fully blessed, fully supported system like commercial
solaris on sun-branded hardware, you will still sometimes encounter bugs.
The further you stray from the beaten path, the more landmines you'll
encounter.  You may do as you wish, theoretically it should all work, but I
advise against it.

What are your purposes?  Have you considered btrfs?  Personally, I have
found btrfs to be more buggy and riddled with landmines than zfs.  I'm
waiting another year before revisiting btrfs again.  I like zfs, but only in
a *fairly* supported configuration.