Veritas File System 5.1 SP1 Administrator"s Guide (5900-1499, April 2011)

Introducing Veritas File

System

This chapter includes the following topics:

■ About Veritas File System

■ Veritas File System features

■ Veritas File System performance enhancements

■ Using Veritas File System

About Veritas File System

A file system is simply a method for storing and organizing computer files and

the data they contain to make it easy to find and access them. More formally, a

file system is a set of abstract data types (such as metadata) that are implemented

for the storage, hierarchical organization, manipulation, navigation, access, and

retrieval of data.

Veritas File System (VxFS) was the first commercial journaling file system. With

journaling, metadata changes are first written to a log (or journal) then to disk.

Since changes do not need to be written in multiple places, throughput is much

faster as the metadata is written asynchronously.

VxFS is also an extent-based, intent logging file system. VxFS is designed for use

in operating environments that require high performance and availability and

deal with large amounts of data.

VxFS major components include:

■ Logging

■ Extents

Chapter