The Linux Ninja

Jeff Layton from Linux Magazine just published “From ext3 to ext4: An Interview with Theodore Ts’o.” The interview goes over the design decisions of ext4, the progression from ext3 to ext4, discuss things like SSD optimization, and and Ted Ts’o even gives some performance tips in the last question of the interview. They do not touch on the recent ext4 delayed allocation bug or the recent kerfuffle on the kernel developers mailing list between Linus and Ted (one possibility for this may be that the interview was conducted before these events transpired). The interview isn’t too long, so go on over and give it a read.

Not a lot of releases this week, but check the list to see what’s new.

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IBM developerWorks has a good article on the anatomy of the ext4 filesystem. The ext filesystem was recently included in the stable 2.6.28 Linux kernel release, so now is a good time to learn more about one of the Linux filesystems of the future. (The Fedora project announced that ext4 would be the default filesystem in their Fedora 11 final release).

Further reading for ext4:

• Kernel Newbies page on ext4 Features
• Phoronix Real World Benchmarks of The Ext4 File-System

The Ubuntu team announced today the availablility of Jaunty Jackalope Alpha-4, which will eventually become Ubuntu 9.04. I know everyone is sick of hearing about Ubuntu, but this release brings some exciting features including a newer kernel, monitor optimized font DPI’s, and the new ext4 filesystem. Obviously, being an alpha there are bugs so be sure to check them out before testing.