ReFS: Microsoft's new file system

LogoMicrosoft's new ReFS file system for Windows 8

 

Microsoft has developed a new file system for Windows 8: ReFS. The "Resilient File System" is to become one of the most robust file systems and to be tailored to the new Windows 8 Storage Spaces. Defective data should be automatically recognized and repaired.

 
 
 

According to Microsoft, ReFS is largely compatible with NTFS (New Technology File System). Frequently used functions of NTFS are converted to ReFS, but rarely used functions are not implemented.
ReFS should also offer high scalability and the lowest possible downtime. This means, for example, that the file system no longer has to be taken "offline" for longer file system checks.

 

Refs

 

With the help of checksums, the integrity of metadata (information about other data) is guaranteed. The user data can be secured with the Integrity Stream, checksums applied to the entire file system. The “copy on write” approach ensures that if the data is changed, the original data is not lost before the changes have been written.


ReFS supports large storage volumes, files and directories up to a theoretical size of 2 ^ 64-1 bytes (around 18 trillion bytes or 16 exabytes) and a name length of 32.000 UniCode characters.
Redundancy and performance should be increased via so-called data striping (broken down into strips) and, if necessary, connected to storage pools of several machines. Disk scrubbing (data integrity) is intended to provide additional protection against latent hard disk errors.


Functions such as BitLocker, Access Control List (access to data), USN journal (notifications of changes), mount points, junction points, repair points, volume snapshots and file IDs are just a few functions that should be taken over from NTFS. Named streams, OIDs, short names, sparse, hard links and quotas, among others, are not accepted.
On the client side, ReFS will not change anything compared to NTFS, access will continue to be made via the same API.

 
 

B + trees

 

Directories are created in the form of a table, which can contain further tables. Files are converted into a line of the higher-level directory as a table with various file attributes.


To ensure that these can become very large, data are mapped as an embedded stream table (offset mapping / checksum). Attributes such as the Access Control Lists are also mapped as a table within the object table. The storage space is distributed through three hierarchical distributors (large, medium, small).

 
btrees
 

robustness

 

In ReFS, metadata is not updated directly, but is stored in a different location on the drive. This prevents metadata corruption if data is changed in the event of a power outage during the process, torn writes. The checksums, which are saved independently of the metadata, offer additional protection. This should make it possible to detect data corruption at an early stage.

 

data Recovery

 

Assumptions on the part of Microsoft, most systems will work with mirrored storage spaces. If the RAM is defective, however, the volume can be damaged. ReFS provides a rescue function called "Salvage" for this. Corrupted data is removed from the volume's namespace. Data integrity

Conclusion

 

ReFS is to be introduced step by step. First the servers will be equipped with ReFS, later the clients will follow and in the third step it will be possible to boot from ReFS. The development of the new file system has been going on for around 20 years and has been extensively tested during this time. Now it's time to wait and see what's coming;)

 

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