ext2 vs ext3 filesystems

[yellowdog-newbie@lists.terrasoftsolutions.com]

Mr. Martin:

On Saturday, August 9, 2003, at 04:01  AM, Bradley Martin wrote:
> what is the difference between these? any reason why ext2 might be 
> more stable than ext3? what does ext3
> offer that ext2 doesn't?

A true expert will correct some of the details, but...

The filesystem ext3 is ext2 with journaling enabled (and ext3 is 
backwards compatible with ext2 -- if you turn off journaling in ext3, 
you return to ext2). I don't understand all the details, but 
"journaling" is an add-on to a filesystem that records changes as they 
are made. Therefore, if there is a tragedy (such as a power failure 
while you are writing a file to disk), recovery is much faster. To a 
certain extent, enabling journaling decreases the need to perform 
"fsck" and similar file checks after a crash.

I would think that, in general, ext3 is preferable to ext2 (as for 
stability, ext3 ought to be more stable). It might be slightly slower 
during file writes, but the advantages should overcome that 
disadvantage.

Best wishes,
Clint

-- 
Dr. Clinton C. MacDonald | <mailto:clint.macdonald@ttuhsc.edu>