$NetBSD: storage,v 1.9 2012/01/14 22:06:16 agc Exp $ NetBSD Storage Roadmap ====================== This is a small roadmap document, and deals with the storage and file systems side of the operating system. The following elements and projects are pencilled in for 6.0, but please do not rely on them being there. Features that will be in 6.0: 2. logical volume management 3. a native port of Sun's ZFS 4. ReFUSE, perfuse and pud 6. Support for flash devices - NAND, and flash file system 7. rump extensions 9. in-kernel iSCSI initiator 10. RAIDframe parity map 11. quota system re-work Features that are planned for future releases: 1. devfs/udevfsd 5. web-based management tools for storage subsystems 8. virtualised disks in userland 12. lfs renovation We'll continue to update this roadmap as features and dates get firmed up. Some explanations ================= 1. udevfsd ---------- There has always been discussion over devfs, and experience with it seems mixed (to be kind). At the same time, carrying around a whole populated /dev seems quite possible and effective, but maybe a bit unwieldy. jmcneill's udevfsd addresses this in a different way, and is currently in othersrc/external/bsd/udevfsd. Not planned for 6.0 right now. Responsible: jmcneill 2. Logical Volume Management ---------------------------- Based on the Linux lvm2 and devmapper software, with a new kernel component for NetBSD written. Merged in 5.99.5 sources, will be in 6.0. Responsible: haad, martin 3. Native port of Sun's ZFS --------------------------- Two Summer of Code projects have been held, concentrating on the provision of ZFS support for NetBSD. Mostly completed by haad, and building on ver's work, this is the port of Sun's ZFS, with modifications to make it compile on NetBSD by ad@, and based on the Sun code for the block layer. Discussions are still taking place to get the design right for support for the openat(2) system call family, and the correct architecture for reclaiming vnodes. The ZFS source code has been committed to the repository. Responsible: haad, ad, ver 4. ReFUSE, perfuse and pud -------------------------- FUSE has two interfaces, the normal high-level one, and a lower-level interface which is closer to the way standard file systems operate. manu's perfuse adds the low-level functionality in the same way that ReFUSE adds the high-level functionality. In addition, there is the "pass to userspace device" framework added by pooka as part of rump. All 3 will be in 6.0. Responsible: pooka, manu, agc 5. Web-based Management tools for Storage Subsystems ---------------------------------------------------- Standard tools for managing the storage subsystems that NetBSD provides, using a standard web-server as the basic user interface on the storage device, allowing remote management by a standard web browser. CIM and related functinoality are interesting datapoints in this space, although credentials and authentication are always challenges in this space. Will not make it into 6.0 Responsible: agc 6. Support for flash devices - NAND, and flash file system ---------------------------------------------------------- ahoka has have contributed many things in this area, including flash(4), flash(9), flashctl(8) and nand(9). In addition, the University of Szeged has contributed chfs, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CHFS, which is described as "the first open source flash specific file system written for NetBSD". All of these will be in 6.0. Responsible: ahoka 7. RUMP Extensions ------------------ Rump support has been in NetBSD for 2 releases now, and continues to be developed actively. Recent additions have included cgd support, and smbfs client support. Responsible: pooka 8. Virtualised disks in Userland -------------------------------- For better support of virtualization, a library which provides a consistent view of virtualized disk images has been developed by jmcneill. This will not make it into 6.0, although some extra functionality for reading vmdk images is available in othersrc/external/bsd/vmdk. Responsible: jmcneill, agc 9. In-kernel iSCSI Initiator ---------------------------- NetBSD has had a userland implementation of an iSCSI initiator since NetBSD 4.99.35, based on ReFUSE. Wasabi Systems kindly contributed their kernel-based iSCSI initiator, and it will be in 6.0. Responsible: riz, agc 10. RAIDframe parity map ------------------------ Jed Davis successfully completed a Summer of Code project to implement parity map zones for RAIDframe. Parity mapping drastically reduces the amount of time spent rewriting parity after an unclean shutdown by keeping better track of which regions might have had outstanding writes. Enabled by default; can be disabled on a per-set basis, or tuned, with the new raidctl(8) commands. Merged in 5.99.22 sources, and will be in 6.0. A separate set of patches is available for NetBSD-5. Responsible: jld 11. quota system re-work ------------------------ The quota system has been re-worked by bouyer, and is in -current right now. dholland is updating and modifying this rework so that it is a more generalised solution, with better features for security. This is expected to be in 6.0, although there is a lot of work to complete. Responsible: bouyer, dholland 12. LFS renovation ------------------ LFS had been de-emphasised in the time period leading up to the 5.0 release, but is undergoing some rework by perseant, and dholland has some contributions in this area too. Responsible: perseant, dholland Alistair Crooks, David Holland Sat Jan 14 05:52:37 PST 2012