File System Implementation

File-System Structure
 File structure
 Logical storage unit
 Collection of related information
 File system resides on secondary storage (disks)
 Provided user interface to storage, mapping logical to physical
 Provides efficient and convenient access to disk by allowing
data to be stored, located retrieved easily
 Disk provides in-place rewrite and random access
 I/O transfers performed in blocks of sectors (usually 512
bytes)
 File control block – storage structure consisting of information
about a file
 Device driver controls the physical device
 File system organized into layers
Layered File System
 File System Layers
 Device drivers manage I/O devices at the I/O control layer
 Given commands like “read drive1, cylinder 72, track 2, sector
10, into memory location 1060” outputs low-level hardware
specific commands to hardware controller
 Basic file system given command like “retrieve block 123”
translates to device driver
 Also manages memory buffers and caches (allocation, freeing,
replacement)
 Buffers hold data in transit
 Caches hold frequently used data
 File organization module understands files, logical address, and
physical blocks
 Translates logical block # to physical block #
 Manages free space, disk allocation
 File System Layers (Cont.)
 Logical file system manages metadata information
 Translates file name into file number, file handle, location by
maintaining file control blocks (inodes in UNIX)
 Directory management
 Protection
 Layering useful for reducing complexity and redundancy, but
adds overhead and can decrease performanceTranslates file
name into file number, file handle, location by maintaining file
control blocks (inodes in UNIX)
 Logical layers can be implemented by any coding method
according to OS designer
 File System Layers (Cont.)
 Many file systems, sometimes many within an operating
system
 Each with its own format (CD-ROM is ISO 9660; Unix has
UFS, FFS; Windows has FAT, FAT32, NTFS as well as
floppy, CD, DVD Blu-ray, Linux has more than 40 types,
with extended file system ext2 and ext3 leading; plus
distributed file systems, etc.)
 New ones still arriving – ZFS, GoogleFS, Oracle ASM,
FUSE
 File-System Implementation
 We have system calls at the API level, but how do we implement
their functions?
 On-disk and in-memory structures
 Boot control block contains info needed by system to boot OS
from that volume
 Needed if volume contains OS, usually first block of volume
 Volume control block (superblock, master file table) contains
volume details
 Total # of blocks, # of free blocks, block size, free block
pointers or array
 Directory structure organizes the files
 Names and inode numbers, master file table
 File-System Implementation (Cont.)
 Per-file File Control Block (FCB) contains many details about
the file
 inode number, permissions, size, dates
 NFTS stores into in master file table using relational DB
structures
 In-Memory File System Structures

 Mount table storing file system mounts, mount points, file

system types
 The following figure illustrates the necessary file system
structures provided by the operating systems
 Figure 12-3(a) refers to opening a file
 Figure 12-3(b) refers to reading a file
 Plus buffers hold data blocks from secondary storage
 Open returns a file handle for subsequent use
 Data from read eventually copied to specified user process
memory address
In-Memory File System Structures
 Partitions and Mounting
 Partition can be a volume containing a file system (“cooked”) or
raw – just a sequence of blocks with no file system
 Boot block can point to boot volume or boot loader set of blocks that
contain enough code to know how to load the kernel from the file
system
 Or a boot management program for multi-os booting
 Root partition contains the OS, other partitions can hold other
Oses, other file systems, or be raw
 Mounted at boot time
 Other partitions can mount automatically or manually
 At mount time, file system consistency checked
 Is all metadata correct?
 If not, fix it, try again
 If yes, add to mount table, allow access
 Virtual File Systems
 Virtual File Systems (VFS) on Unix provide an object-oriented
way of implementing file systems
 VFS allows the same system call interface (the API) to be used
for different types of file systems
 Separates file-system generic operations from
implementation details
 Implementation can be one of many file systems types, or
network file system
 Implements vnodes which hold inodes or network file
details
 Then dispatches operation to appropriate file system
implementation routines
 Virtual File Systems (Cont.)

 The API is to the VFS interface, rather than any specific type of
file system
 Virtual File System Implementation
 For example, Linux has four object types:
 inode, file, superblock, dentry
 VFS defines set of operations on the objects that must be
implemented
 Every object has a pointer to a function table
 Function table has addresses of routines to implement that
function on that object
 For example:
 • int open(. . .)—Open a file
 • int close(. . .)—Close an already-open file
 • ssize t read(. . .)—Read from a file
 • ssize t write(. . .)—Write to a file
 • int mmap(. . .)—Memory-map a file
 Directory Implementation
 Linear list of file names with pointer to the data blocks
 Simple to program
 Time-consuming to execute
 Linear search time
 Could keep ordered alphabetically via linked list or use
B+ tree
 Hash Table – linear list with hash data structure
 Decreases directory search time
 Collisions – situations where two file names hash to the
same location
 Only good if entries are fixed size, or use chained-overflow
method
 Allocation Methods - Contiguous

 An allocation method refers to how disk blocks are allocated for

files:
 Contiguous allocation – each file occupies set of contiguous
blocks
 Best performance in most cases
 Simple – only starting location (block #) and length (number
of blocks) are required
 Problems include finding space for file, knowing file size,
external fragmentation, need for compaction off-line
(downtime) or on-line
 Contiguous Allocation

 Mapping from logical to physical

LA/512

Block to be accessed = Q +
starting address
Displacement into block = R
 Extent-Based Systems

 Many newer file systems (i.e., Veritas File System) use a

modified contiguous allocation scheme

 Extent-based file systems allocate disk blocks in extents

 An extent is a contiguous block of disks

 Extents are allocated for file allocation
 A file consists of one or more extents
 Allocation Methods - Linked
 Linked allocation – each file a linked list of blocks
 File ends at nil pointer
 No external fragmentation
 Each block contains pointer to next block
 No compaction, external fragmentation
 Free space management system called when new block
needed
 Improve efficiency by clustering blocks into groups but
increases internal fragmentation
 Reliability can be a problem
 Locating a block can take many I/Os and disk seeks
 Allocation Methods – Linked (Cont.)
 FAT (File Allocation Table) variation
 Beginning of volume has table, indexed by block number
 Much like a linked list, but faster on disk and cacheable
 New block allocation simple
 Linked Allocation
 Each file is a linked list of disk blocks: blocks may be scattered
anywhere on the disk
block = pointer

 Mapping

Q
LA/511
R
Block to be accessed is the Qth block in the linked chain of blocks
representing the file.

Displacement into block = R + 1

Linked Allocation
File-Allocation Table
 Allocation Methods - Indexed

 Indexed allocation
 Each file has its own index block(s) of pointers to its data blocks

 Logical view

index table
Example of Indexed Allocation
 Indexed Allocation (Cont.)

 Need index table

 Random access

 Dynamic access without external fragmentation, but have overhead

of index block

 Mapping from logical to physical in a file of maximum size of 256K

bytes and block size of 512 bytes. We need only 1 block for index
table
Q
LA/512
R

Q = displacement into index table

R = displacement into block
 Indexed Allocation – Mapping (Cont.)
 Mapping from logical to physical in a file of unbounded length (block
size of 512 words)

 Linked scheme – Link blocks of index table (no limit on size)

Q1
LA / (512 x 511)
R1
Q1 = block of index table
R1 is used as follows:
Q2
R1 / 512
R2

Q2 = displacement into block of index table

R2 displacement into block of file:
 Indexed Allocation – Mapping (Cont.)
 Two-level index (4K blocks could store 1,024 four-byte pointers in outer
index -> 1,048,567 data blocks and file size of up to 4GB)

Q1
LA / (512 x 512)
R1

Q1 = displacement into outer-index

R1 is used as follows:
Q2
R1 / 512
R2

Q2 = displacement into block of index table

R2 displacement into block of file:
Indexed Allocation – Mapping (Cont.)
 Combined Scheme: UNIX UFS
4K bytes per block, 32-bit addresses

More index blocks than can be addressed with 32-bit file pointer
 Performance
 Best method depends on file access type
 Contiguous great for sequential and random
 Linked good for sequential, not random
 Declare access type at creation -> select either contiguous or
linked
 Indexed more complex
 Single block access could require 2 index block reads then
data block read
 Clustering can help improve throughput, reduce CPU
overhead
 Performance (Cont.)
 Adding instructions to the execution path to save one disk I/O is
reasonable
 Intel Core i7 Extreme Edition 990x (2011) at 3.46Ghz = 159,000
MIPS
 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Instructions_per_second
 Typical disk drive at 250 I/Os per second
 159,000 MIPS / 250 = 630 million instructions during one
disk I/O
 Fast SSD drives provide 60,000 IOPS
 159,000 MIPS / 60,000 = 2.65 millions instructions during
one disk I/O