On Wed, Feb 21, 2024 at 12:39:54PM +0100, Reindl Harald wrote: > > you shouldn't create filesystems with a on-disk format that don't support > 64bit timestamps no matter how small the filesystem is > > the arguments on this list where "such a small filesystem isn't expected to > be still used in 2038" which is nonsense in case of a /boot FS in a virtual > machine > > our whole servers already survived 16 years and 30 dist-upgrades This is an individual system administrator's decision. The defaults will not create file systems with 128 byte inodes. However, there are situations where it *does* make sense to use ext4 file systems that can not express timestamps past 2038. For example, at my employer, 128 byte inodes on HDD's because we do *not* preserve file system images across hardware upgrades. Using 128 byte inodes means that there are 32 inodes per 4k inode table block, as opposed to only 16 inodes if you are using a 256 byte inode. There are performance benefits if you are concerned about reducing the 99.99% latency on heavily loaded disks, and reducing the TCO costs for bytes and IOPS for my employer's cluster file system. Furthermore, from an ecological perspective in terms of power and cooling perspective, even *if* hard drives would survive for over 8-10 years, it would be irresponsible to keep those systems in service. So my employer knows what it is doing when it uses explicit mke2fs options and/or mke2fs.conf settings to create file systems with 128 byte inodes. - Ted
