Filesystem List

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 AN!Tools :: Filesystems :: Filesystem List

WARNING

This is currently a living document. It is far from complete, and almost certainly contains errors, omissions and mistakes. DO NOT USE THIS AS AN AUTHORITATIVE DOCUMENT! This warning will be removed only when the author(s) feel the document is as accurate as possible. Until then, you've been warned.

List of Supported Filesystems

A file system is a logical way of storing data on a storage medium. It determines how files and directories are stored, retrieved, sorted, protected and recovered.

A simplified overview:

Most (all?) storage devices use 'sectors' which are small addressable units of space on their medium that actually store the binary data that makes up a file. A file system logically "collects" one or more of these sectors into an addressable 'block'. For example, a file system may create 2,048 byte blocks made up of four 512 bytes sectors on a hard drive's physical platter.

When a file system stores a file, it determines how many blocks will be needed to store the file, splits the file's data into the appropriate number of pieces and writes them to the various blocks and records in an index or table what blocks contain the parts of the file and in what order they were saved in. To later retrieve the file, the file system will consult it's index or table to get a list and order of the blocks that contain the appropriate data and then go and collect the contents of those blocks and rebuild the file.

So in summary; a file system is a piece of software that stores data on and retrieves data from a physical storage medium. How it does this, and what limits and features it has, depends on the particular file system in use.

List of Linux Partition Types

Modern linux kernels recognize the following partition type hex codes:

 0  Empty           24  NEC DOS         81  Minix / old Lin bf  Solaris        
 1  FAT12           39  Plan 9          82  Linux swap / So c1  DRDOS/sec (FAT-
 2  XENIX root      3c  PartitionMagic  83  Linux           c4  DRDOS/sec (FAT-
 3  XENIX usr       40  Venix 80286     84  OS/2 hidden C:  c6  DRDOS/sec (FAT-
 4  FAT16 <32M      41  PPC PReP Boot   85  Linux extended  c7  Syrinx         
 5  Extended        42  SFS             86  NTFS volume set da  Non-FS data    
 6  FAT16           4d  QNX4.x          87  NTFS volume set db  CP/M / CTOS / .
 7  HPFS/NTFS       4e  QNX4.x 2nd part 88  Linux plaintext de  Dell Utility   
 8  AIX             4f  QNX4.x 3rd part 8e  Linux LVM       df  BootIt         
 9  AIX bootable    50  OnTrack DM      93  Amoeba          e1  DOS access     
 a  OS/2 Boot Manag 51  OnTrack DM6 Aux 94  Amoeba BBT      e3  DOS R/O        
 b  W95 FAT32       52  CP/M            9f  BSD/OS          e4  SpeedStor      
 c  W95 FAT32 (LBA) 53  OnTrack DM6 Aux a0  IBM Thinkpad hi eb  BeOS fs        
 e  W95 FAT16 (LBA) 54  OnTrackDM6      a5  FreeBSD         ee  GPT            
 f  W95 Ext'd (LBA) 55  EZ-Drive        a6  OpenBSD         ef  EFI (FAT-12/16/
10  OPUS            56  Golden Bow      a7  NeXTSTEP        f0  Linux/PA-RISC b
11  Hidden FAT12    5c  Priam Edisk     a8  Darwin UFS      f1  SpeedStor      
12  Compaq diagnost 61  SpeedStor       a9  NetBSD          f4  SpeedStor      
14  Hidden FAT16 <3 63  GNU HURD or Sys ab  Darwin boot     f2  DOS secondary  
16  Hidden FAT16    64  Novell Netware  af  HFS / HFS+      fb  VMware VMFS    
17  Hidden HPFS/NTF 65  Novell Netware  b7  BSDI fs         fc  VMware VMKCORE 
18  AST SmartSleep  70  DiskSecure Mult b8  BSDI swap       fd  Linux raid auto
1b  Hidden W95 FAT3 75  PC/IX           bb  Boot Wizard hid fe  LANstep        
1c  Hidden W95 FAT3 80  Old Minix       be  Solaris boot    ff  BBT            
1e  Hidden W95 FAT1

AdvFS

Digital Equipment Corp File System.

- Details on AdvFS

ADFS

Acorn system's 'Advanced Disc Filing System'.

- Details on ADFS

Amiga AFS

'Ami File Safe' used on Amiga operating systems.

- Details on Amiga AFS

Amiga FFS

Amiga 'Fast File System'.

- Details on Amiga FFS

Amiga OFS

Amiga 'Old File System'

- Details on Amiga OFS

AFS (Andrew File System)

Carnegie Mellon University's 'Andrew File System' distributed, networked file system.

- Details on AFS (Andrew File System)

AFS (Atheos File System)

'Atheos File System'.

- Details on AFS (Atheos File System)

BFS

BeOS File System.

Known in Linux as BeFS to avoid confusion with the Boot File System.

- Details on BFS

Berkeley FFS

BSD's Fast File System.

- Details on Berkeley FFS

Berkeley UFS

BSD's UNIX File System.

- Details on Berkeley UFS

BtrFS

Pronounced 'ButterFS', this is an experimental file system from Oracle. It was created in response to the ZFS file system and aims to replace the ext3 file system. Possibly named after "B-tree file system", or the author's desire for a "Better File System". The exact source of the name is not known for certain. Until clarified, TLE-BU will refer to it as the "B-tree file system", as this is what it is based on.

- Details on BtrFS

CBMFS

File system used on Commodore64-compatible 1541 and 1581 floppy drives.

- Details on CBMFS

CDfs

This is a virtual file system under Linux used to mount audio CDs in a manner that allows the audio tracks on the CD to be read as files.

- Details on CDfs

CFS

HP's 'Cluster File System'.

- Details on CFS

CMDFS

A filesystem extension added to CBMFS by Creative Micro Designs (Unofficial site), Commodore Key, for use in their 3.5 inch floppy drives, RAM disks, and hard drive controllers.

- Details on CMDFS

Coda

Carnegie Mellon University's network file system. It doesn't seem to be an acronym for anything.

- Details on Coda

CrossDOS

Amiga CrossDOS File system

- Details on CrossDOS

CXFS

'Cluster XFS' is SGI's distributed file system used on their SAN storage devices.

- Details on CXFS

dCache

Fermilab's free, fault-tolerant cluster file system.

- Details on dCache

devfs

This is a virtual file system used on UNIX-like operating systems. It is mounted as a normal file system, but the "files" contained in it are actually interfaces to devices on the system. Linux kernel 2.6.18 flagged 'devfs' as obsolete and encourages switching to udev. Other UNIX-like operating systems still used this.

- Details on devfs

DFS (Acorn)

Acorn's 'Disk Filing System'

- Details on DFS (Acorn)

DFS (Microsoft)

Microsoft's 'Distributed File System' that organizes several SMB shares into a common distributed file system.

- Details on DFS (Microsoft)

DRBD

DRBD is an acronym for Distributed Replicated Block Device. It is not a true file system but rather a virtual block device that spans two or more real block devices, each on a different server.

- Details on DRBD

DTFS

SCO's 'DeskTop File System' used by OpenServer.

- Details on DTFS

eCryptFS

This is not a true file system, but is in fact an open source encrypted virtual file system that is mounted on top of an existing file system.

- Details on eCryptFS

EMC Celerra HighRoad

EMC's distributed file system, now known as MPFS, available on AIX, HP-UX, IRIX, Solaris and Windows operating systems.

- Details EMC Celerra HighRoad

encfs

The 'ENCrypted File System' is not itself a file system, but is instead an encrypted volume on top of an existing file system. It creates an encrypted store for data that, when mounted, will grow or shrink as need up to the capacity on the host file system(s). It can occupy more that one file system if it's contents cross file system boundries.

- Details on encfs

Episode

Primarily used for the Distributed Computing Environment's Distributed File System (DCE/DFS)

- Details on Episode

ETRFS

EBS's commercial FAT-variant file systems they refer to as 'FAT64'. They have three flavours;

  • ERTFS-ProPlus64 (licensed)
  • ERTFS-Pro (royalty free, available source code)
  • ERTFS-Basic (royalty free, available source code)

- Details on ETRFS

ExaFS

Exanet's proprietary scalable distributed file system.

- Details on ExaFS

ext

Extended File System. The first file system for Linux.

- Details on ext

ext2

Second Extended File System.

- Details on ext2

ext3

Third Extended File System.

- Details on ext3

ext3cow

Third Extended File System with Copy On Write.

- Details on ext3cow

ext4

Fourth Extended File System.

- Details on ext4

EFS

SGI's 'Extent File System' for IRIX pre-5.2.

- Details on EFS

FAT

Microsoft's 'File Allocation System' file system originally for it's MS-DOS operating system. The initial version of FAT is now known as FAT12 and is a partially patented open standard (ECMA-107 and ISO/IEC 9293). It is perhaps the most widely supported file system in use.

- Details on FAT

FAT12

The initial version of FAT, now known as 'FAT12', was designed for floppy disk storage.

- Details on FAT12

FAT16 (Initial)

The initial 16-bit version of the FAT file system released by Microsoft in it's MS-DOS ver. 3.0, release to coincide with the release of IBM's PC AT computer system. It retained FAT12's 32 MiB maximum maximum partition size though.

- Details on FAT16 (Initial)

FAT16

What today is the final version of FAT16 was released by Compaq DOS ver. 3.31. It increased the maximum partition size to 2 GiB.

- Details on FAT16

FAT32

Microsoft's DOS-compatible 32-bit file system designed to support disks up to 8 TiB (2 TiB if the booting from the partition was required). Do to support requirements of some Microsoft 16-bit applications, limits were placed to only allow partition sizes up to 127.53 GiB in Windows 95/98. Windows 2000/XP are restricted to 32 GiB during setup but otherwise can use the maximum size.

- Details on FAT32

FATX

Microsoft's FAT File System for the X-Box gaming system's hard drive and memory cards. It differs slightly in that the epoch is the year 2000 instead of the year 1980.

- Details on FATX

Files-11

HP's Files-11 file system used on it's OpenVMS operating system.

- Details on Files-11

Fossil

Bell Labs Plan 9 File System.

- Details on Fossil

fsfs

The 'Fast Secure File System' is not a true file system but is instead an encrypted file system that exists on top of a real file system.

- Details of fsfs

Gfarm File System

Asia Pacific Grid's open-source cluster file system for use on the Grid Data Farm architecture.

- Details on Gfarm File System

GFS

The 'Global File System' is a Shared Disk cluster file system for Linux.

- Details on GFS

GlusterFS

An open-source cluster file system designed to scale into multi-petabyte size clusters using commodity hardware storage devices developed by Z Research Inc..

- Details on GlusterFS

GPFS

IBM's 'General Parallel File System' shared disk cluster file system.

- Details on GPFS

HFS

Apple's Hierarchical File System used on their Mac OS operating systems.

- Details on HFS

HFS+

Apple's 'Hierarchical File System Plus' used on their OS X operating systems, their iPod music player and their iPhone.

- Details on HFS+

HPFS

OS/2's 'High Performance File System', created to replace the FAT file system.

- Details on HPFS

HTFS

SCO's 'High Throughput Filesystem' used on their OpenServer operating system.

- Details on HTFS

InterMezzo

InterMezzo is a distributed file system for Linux that runs on top of another journaled file system.

- Details on InterMezzo

ISO 9660

International Organization for Standardization (ISO) defined file system for CD-ROM media.

- Details on ISO 9660

JFFS

'Journalling Flash File System' is a log-structured file system for use on NOR flash storage devices.

- Details on JFFS

JFFS2

The second version of the 'Journalling Flash File System' added in Linux Kernel 2.4.10. It added support for NAND flash storage devices.

- Details on JFFS2

JFS

IBM's 64-bit 'Journaled File System'.

- Details on JFS

LFS

John Ousterhout's 'Log-structured File System'.

- Details on LFS

lnfs

Bell Labs' Plan 9 'Long Name File System' is not a file system iteself, but is an extension to other file systems like early versions of FAT that enables file names longer that 8.3 characters. It works in a similar way to UMSDOS.

- Details on lnfs

LogFS

LogFS is a log-structured file system designed to replace JFFS2 on larger flash storage devices.

- Details on LogFS

Luster

'Luster' (the name is derived from 'Linux clUSTER'), is an open-source cluster file system developed by Sun Microsystems for Solaris and Linux.

- Details on Luster

Melio FS

Sanbolic's clustered file system for network environments.

- Details on Melio FS

MFS

Apple's 'Macintosh File System' used on their 400kb floppy disks.

- Details on MFS

MINIX FS

'MINIX File System'.

- Details on MINIX FS

Nasan

DataPlow's distributed network file system for NAS and SAN (hence it's name) storage devices.

- Details on Nasan

NILFS

Nippon Telephone and Telegraph CyberSpace Laboratories's 'New Implementation of a Log-structured File System'.

- Details on NILFS

NFS

The 'Network File System' is not, in fact, a file system but instead is a protocol for sharing another underlying file system over a network connection. It was created by IBM and Sun Microsystems, and is very popular on most all UNIX-like operating systems, including Linux. It is one of the major device types supported by TLE-BU.

- Details on NFS

NTFS

Microsoft's 'New Technology File System'.

- Details on NTFS

NWFS

Novell's 'NetWare File System'.

- Details on NWFS

NSS

'Novell Storage Service' file system.

- Details on NSS

OCFS

'Oracle Cluster File System' is Oracle's open-source cluster file system.

- Details on OCFS

OCFS2

The second version of 'Oracle Cluster File System' is Oracle's open-source cluster file system. Version 2 was added to the Linux kernel at version 2.6.16.

- Details on OCFS2

OneFS

Isilon's commercial cluster file system.

- Details on OneFS

PanFS

Panasas's commercial cluster file system. Licensed Linux drivers available.

- Details on PanFS

PeerFS

Radiant Data's commercial cluster file system. Licensed Linux drivers available.

- Details on PeerFS

PFS

Amiga's 'Professional File System'.

- Details on PFS

procfs

This is a virtual file system used on UNIX-like operating systems. It is mounted as a normal file system, but the "files" contained in it are actually interfaces to a process or some aspect of the kernel, like memory usage, device states and such.

- Details on procfs

PVFS

The 'Parallel Virtual File System' is an open-source distributed file system.

- Details on PVFS

QFS

Sun's 'Quick File System', sometimes referred to as 'SAM-QFS' because of it's tight integration with the Storage and Archive Manager.

- Details on QFS

QNX4FS

QNX extent-based File System used on QNX4 and QNX6 operating systems.

- Details on QNX4FS

RAIF

The 'Redundant Array of Independent File systems' is designed to work like RAID but uses other file systems instead of physical storage devices.

- Details on RAIF

ReiserFS

Namesys's journaled file system founded by Hans Reiser.

- Details on ReiserFS

Reiser4

Namesys's fourth version of their journaled file system founded by Hans Reiser.

- Details on Reiser4

S51K

SCO's SysV 1kb File system used on their OpenServer operating system.

- Details on S51K

SAM-QFS

This is another name for Sun's QFS, used because of it's tight coupling to the Storage and Archive Manager.

- Details on SAM-QFS (Redirect to QFS)

SCO AFS

SCO's 'Acer Fast file System' used on their OpenServer operating system.

- Details on SCO AFS

SFS (Amiga)

Amiga's journaling 'Smart File System' created by John Hendrikx.

- Details on SFS (Amiga)

SkyFS

SkyOS's File System, based on openBFS.

- Details on SkyFS

SMB

The 'Server Message Block' is not actually a file system, but is in fact a protocol for sharing an underlying file system's data over a network. It is primarily used by Microsoft's Windows operating systems and the open-source Samba server program. It is one of the main device types supported by TLE-BU.

- Details on SMB

SMBFS

This is another way of referring to an SMB network share.

- Details on SMBFS (Redirects to SMB)

SolFS

ELDOS's 'SOLid File System'. It is a commercial virtual file system designed to give program authors the ability to have a virtual file system for storing their application's data in a manner that is not accessible to users outside the program.

- Details on SolFS

SpadFS

An experimental Linux file system created by Mikuláš Patočka. It is not in wide use and is, in fact, named after the Czech acronyn (Systém pro Psychopaty A Debily) (English: 'System for psychopaths and idiots').

- Details on SpadFS

SSHFS

The 'Secure SHell File System' is not actually a file system, but is in fact a protocol for mounting a directory on a remote machine over SSH. It has many limitations in that you can not see how much space is used or available on the remote machine, however, it does provide a secure transport for moving data between two machines.

- Details on SSHFS

Starfish

Starfish is a commercial (free for less that 1 TB clusters) distributed file system.

- Details on Starfish

StorNext File System

Quantum's Shared-Disk file system for Windows, OSX (as Xsan), Red Hat Linux, SuSE Linux, HP-UX, Solaris, AIX, and IRIX.

- Details on StorNext File System

sysfs

This is a virtual file system used by the Linux kernel version 2.6. Like udev, it is designed to replace the aging devfs pseudo file system. Most modern Linux distributions based on the 2.6 kernel offer both the 'sysfs' and either 'devfs' or 'udev' pseudo file systems.

- Details on sysfs

TerraGrid Cluster File System

Rackable Systems's 'TerraGrid Cluster File System' commercial cluster file system. Licensed drivers available for Linux.

- Details on TCFS

TMPFS

This is a virtual file system used on UNIX-like operating systems. It behaves as a normal file system, but data written to it is stored in virtual memory and is lost on shut down.

- Details on TMPFS

TrueCrypt

This is not a true file system but is instead an encrypted file system that exists on top of a real file system.

- Details of TrueCrypt

udev

This is a virtual file system used on UNIX-like operating systems. It is mounted as a normal file system, but the "files" contained in it are actually interfaces to devices on the system. This began to replace devfs in Linux kernel 2.6.16.

- Details on udev

UDF

'Universal Disk Format' is not, itself, a file system but is instead a standard meant to eventually replace ISO 9660 for use on optical media.

- Details on UDF

UFS

'UNIX File System' is also known as 'Fast File System' or the 'Berkeley/BSD Fast File System'.

- Details on UFS

UFS2

'UNIX File System 2' is UFS with 64-bit block pointers.

- Details on UFS2

UMSDOS

This is an overlay file system that stores UNIX-style permissions on FAT partitions. It does this by storing the metadata in special files named '--linux-.---'.

- Details on UMSDOS

VLIR

'Variable Length Indexed Record' file system extension of CBMFS created by Berkeley Softworks for the GEOS 8-bit operating system.

- Details on VLIR

VMFS

VMware's 'Virtual Machine File System' distributed file system for use in their VMware ESX Server virtualization suite.

- Details on VMFS

VxFS

'Veritas File System' (known as JFS and OJFS in HP-UX) extent-based file system.

- Details on VxFS

WAFL

Network Appliance's 'Write Anywhere File Layout' file system for use on large RAID arrays.

- Details on WAFL

WinFS

Microsoft's Future Storage file system designed to eventually replace NTFS. It is not currently available outside of Microsoft's labs.

- Details on WinFS

XFS

SGI's journaled file system, originally for their IRIX operating system.

- Details on XFS

Xsan

Apple's version of the StorNext File System distributed file system.

- Details on Xsan

YAFFS

Aleph One's 'Yet Another Flash File System' designed specifically for NAND flash storage devices.

- Details on YAFFS

ZFS

Sun Microsystems's open-source file system written for their Solaris operating system.

- Details on ZFS

 

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