[OpenAFS] OpenAFS vs NFSv4?

[Derrick J Brashear]

On Tue, 29 Apr 2003, Ted Anderson wrote:

>     * it provides replication
>        * no, that is implemented by the volser

The ability to transparently fall over to one is in the client, though.
An automount map and NFSv3 should have the same ability, I'd guess, but
doesn't.

> The key to getting the idea to spread, is to create a clear and sharp
> exposition of the benefits which highlights the distinctions with other
> distributed file systems.  I don't think this message does the trick,
> but hopefully it helps.

The other thing is the maintenance burden that people talk about seems to
be overstated. The buy-in cost is non-trivial, but I have an AFS cell
which I've been running since 1994, with really no substantial work done
on it in years. (And secretly the cell was cloned from another whose name
I had no legitimate DNS claim on, which was about a year older)

What I've done has been deploying new binaries occasionally, moving most
of the data from a SunOS 4 fileserver (it's still a dbserver) to a Linux
fileserver, and adding a disk to said Linux fileserver. Other than that,
it's all just adding volumes, and making backups. I haven't even bothered
with tools to do it, because it's not enough work to justify setting up
tools for it.

You can argue a small "hobby cell" isn't the best comparison. You're
probably right. I also have a .4TB cell in my attic, but with ~4 users
instead of the ~100 that the older cell has. This cell gets literally 0
maintenance. Again, not a good comparison.

The point here is, AFS withstands a lot of neglect. You're likely to spend
more time setting it up than you'll need over a year of administering. If
it's already set up, you don't even have that.