ext2 (second extended filesystem) is a file system that was commonly used by the Linux kernel, but has been largely replaced by ext3/ext4.
Questions tagged [ext2]
77 questions
138
votes
11 answers
How do I know if a partition is ext2, ext3, or ext4?
I just formatted stuff. One disk I format as ext2. The other I want to format as ext4. I want to test how they perform.
Now, how do I know the kind of file system in a partition?
user4951
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votes
4 answers
What is the difference between "inode size" and "Bytes per inode"
Below information is taken from man page,I would like to know the difference between bytes-per-inode and Inode-size?
-i bytes-per-inode
Specify the bytes/inode ratio. mke2fs creates an inode for every bytes-per-inode bytes of space on the disk.…
Akheel Asadi
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21
votes
2 answers
largefile feature at creating file-system
Is useful to use -T largefile flag at creating a file-system for a partition with big files like video, and audio in flac format?
I tested the same partition with that flag and without it, and using tune2fs -l [partition], I checked in "Filesystem…
Marc
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13
votes
3 answers
Can the filesystem become inconsistent if interrupted when moving a file?
I have two folders on the same partition (EXT2)
If I mv folder1/file folder2 and some interruption occur (e.g. power failure) could the file system ever end up being inconsistent?
Isn't the mv operation atomic?
Update:
So far on IRC I got the…
graphtheory92
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11
votes
3 answers
ext2/3/4 reserved blocks percentage purpose
I know that this feature dates back 20 years but I still would like to find out
What is the purpose of the reserved blocks in ext2/3/4 filesystems?
Karlson
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11
votes
1 answer
zerofree verbose returns what?
zerofree -v /dev/sda1 returned
123642/1860888/3327744.
The man page does not explain what those numbers are:
http://manpages.ubuntu.com/manpages/natty/man8/zerofree.8.html
I found some code on…
plamtrue
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10
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1 answer
What is the difference between fsck options -y and -p?
The ext2/3/4 filesystem checker has two options that seem to be very similar, -p and -y.
Both seem to perform an automatic repair, but the manpage states that -p can exit when it encounters certain errors while for -y no such thing is mentioned. Is…
AndreKR
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9
votes
2 answers
Defragging an ext partition?
Why don't ext2/3/4 need to be defragmented? Is there no fragmentation at all?
uray
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8
votes
1 answer
What determines the maximum file size in ext2 file system
I was reading the Kernel Documentation where it says
There are various limits imposed by the on-disk layout of ext2. Other
limits are imposed by the current implementation of the kernel code.
Many of the limits are determined at the time the…
user3539
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8
votes
3 answers
How many bits is the access flags of a file?
How many bits on a linux file system is taken up for the permissions of a file?
Philoxopher
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7
votes
1 answer
How are files laid out in ext2/ext3/ext4?
A few days ago all my metadata on a ext4 format flash card was overwritten.
I am now going to speculate on how this happened. This is pure speculation. It happened just after I used a different card. The volume label on the card is now the same as…
Mouse.The.Lucky.Dog
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7
votes
2 answers
"Converting" a filesystem from ext3 to ext4
I've read on some Q&A on this website that one can "convert" an ext3 filesystem to ext4 without formatting, by issuing
tune2fs -O extents,uninit_bg,dir_index /dev/dev-name
And then running fsck.
I have a few questions regarding said operation,…
Jacob
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7
votes
2 answers
Reliable way to detect ext2 or ext3 or ext4?
I need to detect a filesystem type from a C/C++ program using the filesystem superblock. However, I don't see much differences between superblocks for ext2 and ext4. The s_rev_level field is the same (=1), the s_minor_rev_level is the same (=0).
I…
HEKTO
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How can I dump the contents of a filesystem's superblock?
I understand that I can list the location of a filesystem's superblocks using the following commands.
Example
First get the device handle for the current directory.
$ df -h .
Filesystem Size Used Avail Use% Mounted…
slm
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votes
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What is the most recent technique to implement quotas?
Is the quota approach still in use to limit the usage of disk space and/or the concurrency between users.
Quota works with aquota.user files in the concerned directories AND some settings in /etc/fstab with options like usrquota…
But some times,…
Sandburg
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