New Filesystem developement under process……….. Its great to hear…!!!!!
Community Investment in ext3 Development
Theodore Ts’o offered an insightful summary of issues that affect the future development of the ext3 filesystem. He emphasized that many people feel invested in the future plans for ext2/ext3, since it remains one of the most popular and widely used filesystems, especially among kernel developers. Because of this, the stakes for its direction run higher than for other filesystems.
Key Concerns: Stability, Compatibility, and Complexity
Ts’o identified three main concerns for future development: stability, compatibility confusion, and code complexity. He noted that discussions two months earlier often mixed these concerns, which slowed progress. According to him, Linus focused primarily on stability, with some attention to code complexity, while others placed much heavier emphasis on compatibility issues.
A Four-Step Plan for ext4 Development
Theodore explained that the ext2/3 developers had agreed on a path forward after internal discussions. To address the issues, they proposed a four-step plan. The first step called for creating a new ext4 filesystem, temporarily registered with the kernel as “ext3dev.” This filesystem would carry an explicit CONFIG_EXPERIMENTAL label and serve as a development fork of ext3. In addition, the team planned to split fs/jbd to support 64-bit jbd, which would power both fs/ext4 and future versions of ocfs2.
Feature Development and Upgrade Path
Theodore explained that developers would add new features to the ext3dev tree, while the stable ext3 tree would only receive bug fixes. He emphasized the importance of keeping the ext4 codebase able to mount ext3 filesystems, ensuring a smooth upgrade path for users moving from ext3 to ext4.
Timeline Toward Full ext4 Adoption
He outlined the timeline: in about six to nine months, once developers feel confident that fs/ext4 includes the right set of features and that the filesystem format has stabilized, they plan to submit a patch that registers the code as the official ext4 filesystem. Theodore also noted that once ext4 reaches full stability, it may completely replace ext3 in the source tree.
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New File System
