From: Darrick J. Wong <darrick.wong@xxxxxxxxxx> Signed-off-by: Darrick J. Wong <darrick.wong@xxxxxxxxxx> --- .../filesystems/xfs-data-structures/overview.rst | 1 .../filesystems/xfs-data-structures/reflink.rst | 43 ++++++++++++++++++++ 2 files changed, 44 insertions(+) create mode 100644 Documentation/filesystems/xfs-data-structures/reflink.rst diff --git a/Documentation/filesystems/xfs-data-structures/overview.rst b/Documentation/filesystems/xfs-data-structures/overview.rst index 457e81c0eb40..d8d668ec6097 100644 --- a/Documentation/filesystems/xfs-data-structures/overview.rst +++ b/Documentation/filesystems/xfs-data-structures/overview.rst @@ -45,3 +45,4 @@ latency. .. include:: self_describing_metadata.rst .. include:: delayed_logging.rst +.. include:: reflink.rst diff --git a/Documentation/filesystems/xfs-data-structures/reflink.rst b/Documentation/filesystems/xfs-data-structures/reflink.rst new file mode 100644 index 000000000000..653b3def7e6e --- /dev/null +++ b/Documentation/filesystems/xfs-data-structures/reflink.rst @@ -0,0 +1,43 @@ +.. SPDX-License-Identifier: CC-BY-SA-4.0 + +Sharing Data Blocks +------------------- + +On a traditional filesystem, there is a 1:1 mapping between a logical block +offset in a file and a physical block on disk, which is to say that physical +blocks are not shared. However, there exist various use cases for being able +to share blocks between files — deduplicating files saves space on archival +systems; creating space-efficient clones of disk images for virtual machines +and containers facilitates efficient datacenters; and deferring the payment of +the allocation cost of a file system tree copy as long as possible makes +regular work faster. In all of these cases, a write to one of the shared +copies **must** not affect the other shared copies, which means that writes to +shared blocks must employ a copy-on-write strategy. Sharing blocks in this +manner is commonly referred to as "reflinking". + +XFS implements block sharing in a fairly straightforward manner. All existing +data fork structures remain unchanged, save for the addition of a +per-allocation group `reference count B+tree <#reference-count-b-tree>`__. This +data structure tracks reference counts for all shared physical blocks, with a +few rules to maintain compatibility with existing code: If a block is free, it +will be tracked in the free space B+trees. If a block is owned by a single +file, it appears in neither the free space nor the reference count B+trees. If +a block is shared, it will appear in the reference count B+tree with a +reference count >= 2. The first two cases are established precedent in XFS, so +the third case is the only behavioral change. + +When a filesystem block is shared, the block mapping in the destination file +is updated to point to that filesystem block and the reference count B+tree +records are updated to reflect the increased reference count. If a shared +block is written, a new block will be allocated, the dirty data written to +this new block, and the file’s block mapping updated to point to the new +block. If a shared block is unmapped, the reference count records are updated +to reflect the decreased reference count and the block is also freed if its +reference count becomes zero. This enables users to create space efficient +clones of disk images and to copy filesystem subtrees quickly, using the +standard Linux coreutils packages. + +Deduplication employs the same mechanism to share blocks and copy them at +write time. However, the kernel confirms that the contents of both files are +identical before updating the destination file’s mapping. This enables XFS to +be used by userspace deduplication programs such as duperemove.
