Fast Track to Solaris 10 Adoption: ZFS Technology
Compatibility Issues
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- Will ZFS be "open" enough that my Windows or Linux OS on the same box will be able to at least mount ZFS in read-only mode?
- Where can I find the matrix for Hardware support?
- How will ZFS work with a SAN? Any potential problems among different vendor solutions?
- But there are no plans to back-port ZFS to the Solaris 8 or 9 operating systems through kernel Updates, right?
- In Solaris Volume Manager for the Solaris 9 OS you can build replicas for pools; should you use replicas state database for the Solaris 10 OS (ZFS)?
- How will ZFS play with Samba?
- Trying to connect some numbers: 128-bit file system, 64-bit checksum, and 64-bit processor. Does 64-bit processor limit the checksum size? Will a 128-bit processor be required to take full advantage of ZFS?
- My production systems run Oracle 9 on NetApp filers. How would you compare ZFS and WAFL? Some concepts seem similar, like copy-on-write.
- Are quotas supported on ZFS ?
- Can I convert UFS and VXFS to ZFS ?
- Will ZFS support quotas?
- Does ZFS support iSCSI?
- Are you working at all with Veritas to add this to the NetBackup application — or other ISVs — for use in backup-to-disk? Or with Solstice backup, for that matter?
- Will Live Upgrade be integrated so I can convert my file systems from UFS to ZFS as part of the upgrade process?
- Will ZFS support Oracle data files? Is there "quick I/O" or ODM support?
- Will ZFS work on EOL hardware such as the Ultra 5?
- Will ZFS be cluster aware? How will storage pools be migrated? Will Sun cluster and VCS support this at a future time?
- When will Oracle certify ZFS?
- Are you working with major database and other application vendors, such as Oracle, to make sure they will work out of the box? Is there going to be any benchmark like TPC-C/D with Oracle when the Solaris 10 OS is released?
- Can UFS work with ZFS?
- Will ZFS work with Sun Cluster on a shared disk ?
- I would like to know whether there is a RAC Testing-Scenario based on FireWire-shared-disk on the roadmap for x86 Solaris OS and Oracle. This would provide the opportunity to test database clusters without expensive costs for Fiber Channel Hardware.
- Can we expect any new I/O tools (such as iostat) to be introducted with ZFS or just updates to the current tools?
- Does ZFS provided mirroring/RAID5 capabilities in the storage pool, or is it designed to run on top of SEVM/VXVM?
- Is ZFS hardware specific? Does it only run on Sun storage or can it be run on EMC, etc.?
- What volume manager tool works with ZFS?
- Will or does ZFS support multi-reader, multi-writer type file systems through a SAN?
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Q: Will ZFS be "open" enough that my Windows or Linux OS on the same box will be able to at least mount ZFS in read-only mode?
A: In our initial release, we will not have support for other operating systems. We have thought about providing this, though.
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Q: Where can I find the matrix for Hardware support?
A: Go to the Software Express Web site, click the "get the software" link, and look at the "hardware requirements" section at the bottom of that page.
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Q: How will ZFS work with a SAN? Any potential problems among different vendor solutions?
A: ZFS will work just fine in a SAN.
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Q: But there are no plans to back-port ZFS to the Solaris 8 or 9 operating systems through kernel Updates, right?
A: That is correct.
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Q: In Solaris Volume Manager for the Solaris 9 OS you can build replicas for pools; should you use replicas state database for the Solaris 10 OS (ZFS)?
A: With ZFS, there is no separate state database. All states in ZFS are maintained internally with an appropriate level of replication.
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Q: How will ZFS play with Samba?
A: Samba can be used to share ZFS data just as with any local filesystem.
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Q: Trying to connect some numbers: 128-bit file system, 64-bit checksum, and 64-bit processor. Does 64-bit processor limit the checksum size? Will a 128-bit processor be required to take full advantage of ZFS?
A: All these values are independent of the processor size. ZFS will work on any system supported by Solaris 10 system, which includes Pentium, AMD64 (both 32- and 64-bit mode), UltraSPARC and SPARC64.
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Q: My production systems run Oracle 9 on NetApp filers. How would you compare ZFS and WAFL? Some concepts seem similar, like copy-on-write.
A: One difference is that ZFS runs on the host, so Oracle doesn't need to go over the network to get to a NetApp box.
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Q: Are quotas supported on ZFS ?
A: Yes.
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Q: Can I convert UFS and VXFS to ZFS ?
A: Right now, it'd be via dump and restore. Migration tools are on the roadmap for sometime after the initial ZFS release.
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Q: Will ZFS support quotas?
A: Yes, ZFS will support setting both a quota and reservation on each filesystem.
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Q: Does ZFS support iSCSI?
A: Yes.
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Q: Are you working at all with Veritas to add this to the NetBackup application — or other ISVs — for use in backup-to-disk? Or with Solstice backup, for that matter?
A: We are working with all the vendors who support Solaris OS platform.
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Q: Will Live Upgrade be integrated so I can convert my file systems from UFS to ZFS as part of the upgrade process?
A: It's under investigation, but it won't be part of the initial release.
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Q: Will ZFS support Oracle data files? Is there "quick I/O" or ODM support?
A: We will support Oracle data files. Also, we are trying to make every I/O a "quick" I/O. We don't believe that an application should have to play special tricks or give us special flags to get full performance out of their system, and we are currently benchmarking with Oracle to make sure this will be true.
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Q: Will ZFS work on EOL hardware such as the Ultra 5?
A: ZFS will work on any system supported by the Solaris 10 OS, which does include the Ultra 5.
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Q: Will ZFS be cluster aware? How will storage pools be migrated? Will Sun cluster and VCS support this at a future time?
A: Currently, we support HA storage+, which means that ZFS can use shared disks, as long as only a single machine is using the pool at a time. We are investigating making it more aware of a cluster environment to relax this constraint in the future.
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Q: When will Oracle certify ZFS?
A: Oracle has already publicly stated their support for the Solaris 10 OS; details as to when this will include specific features such as ZFS are TBD. I'd recommend checking with Oracle on this — among other things, it gives them reinforced feedback that customers are looking for this from them.
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Q: Are you working with major database and other application vendors, such as Oracle, to make sure they will work out of the box? Is there going to be any benchmark like TPC-C/D with Oracle when the Solaris 10 OS is released?
A: Yes, we are actively working with the database vendors on certification and benchmarking. Oracle has already stated their intent to support the Solaris 10 OS.
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Q: Can UFS work with ZFS?
A: UFS and ZFS can co-exist on the same system.
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Q: Will ZFS work with Sun Cluster on a shared disk ?
A: ZFS will support HA Storage+. This allows a storage pool that is connected to multiple hosts to "fail over" to a good host. Only one host can access the storage pool at a time.
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Q: I would like to know whether there is a RAC Testing-Scenario based on FireWire-shared-disk on the roadmap for x86 Solaris OS and Oracle. This would provide the opportunity to test database clusters without expensive costs for Fiber Channel Hardware.
A: The Solaris 10 OS supports FireWire disks, and ZFS works fine on top of them. If you wish to configure Oracle on top of such a configuration, that would be supported.
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Q: Can we expect any new I/O tools (such as iostat) to be introducted with ZFS or just updates to the current tools?
A: All the current tools report I/O information from ZFS. In addition, we have "zpool iostat," which reports more detailed and ZFS-specific information.
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Q: Does ZFS provided mirroring/RAID5 capabilities in the storage pool, or is it designed to run on top of SEVM/VXVM?
A: ZFS incorporates the capabilities of volume managers — e.g., mirroring, striping, raid. Thus a volume manager (e.g., SVM, VxVM) is not necessary.
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Q: Is ZFS hardware specific? Does it only run on Sun storage or can it be run on EMC, etc.?
A: ZFS works on any underlying storage that the Solaris 10 OS is accessing. It works best on raw storage because we can apply our Predictive Self-Healing functions to it.
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Q: What volume manager tool works with ZFS?
A: ZFS has its own built-in functionality that replaces traditional volume managers.
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Q: Will or does ZFS support multi-reader, multi-writer type file systems through a SAN?
A: Not in the current release. We are looking at ways in which we could do this in the future, but it will not be in the Solaris 10 OS.
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