Greetings!

First question:
I am configuring a server to hold source trees for 4.8/4.9 and maybe -current for 
production and experimental upgrades on my several FreeBSD servers. Currently, I only 
keep the -release sources for maintaining patchlevels on the individual boxes 
themselves. The last time I started adding the -current source tree on a 
non-production server, I ran out of inodes before actually completing the CVS sync. 
What newfs blocksize/fragment size and inode density is optimal for 10 to 16 GB 
partition containing just source trees? The default stripe size on the RAID controller 
is set to 128k for mirrored drives.

Hardware: Compaq ProLiant DL360, dual 18GB (mirrored) drives, with Compaq 5i 
SmartArray controller. FreeBSD 5.1

Next question:
Are there optimal newfs block/fragment/inode options for a quad-disk, 1+0 RAID for a 
mail server running Postfix? Specifically, the queue directory and the home (Maildir) 
directories are what I'll need to optimize. I think the queue directory will be heavy 
read/write, whereas I imagine that the Maildir directories (kept on a different 
partition) will be more write-intensive over-all. The queue directory will reside on a 
(approximately) 1 GB /var partition, and the Maildirs will be on a roughly 27 GB /home 
partition (no other user files on /home). The default stripe size on the RAID 
controller is set to 128k for mirrored drives. I was looking at the tuning(7) 
recommendations of something like block size 8192 and frag size 1024 for the queue and 
Maildir directories. SInce Maildir will have to accomodate occasional large files with 
attachments, this seems like it might be a happy medium. I don't have a specific usage 
pattern developed on the number of/size of email files and attachments, so I am 
planning on a vague, nebulous "average email use".

Hardware: SGI 1200, quad 18GB (RAID 1+0) drives, Compaq 4200 SmartArray controller, 
FreeBSD 4.9

Another question:
I've been doing a lot of reading on filesystem/RAID levels for database use (I'm not a 
DB guy). I don't have a server ready for this yet, but i would like some generic 
recommendations on filesystem setup. I've read that mirrored stripes (0+1 or 1+0) is 
better overall than RAID 5. Any other tuning tips, such as block size, inode, 
async/sync/softupdates, etc for a partition to hold an SQL database (such as MySQL or 
Postgres, etc)? The tuning(7) man page seems to indicate a default block size (16k) 
but fewer inodes for databases.

Hardware: SGI 1200, quad 18GB (RAID 1+0) drives, Compaq 4200 SmartArray controller, 
FreeBSD 4.9

Last question:
With a good battery-backed caching controller (such as the Compaq SmartArray cards), 
is SoftUpdates of any use? My understanding is that SoftUpdates does in software the 
same sort of caching that RAID controllers would do. Am I correct or way off base? 
Should I mount all drives synchronous without SoftUpdates, or asynchronous with 
SoftUpdates, or what is the recommended choice when using real server-class SCSI RAID 
controllers? I am more concerned overall with higher-availability than 
higher-performance.

Thanks in advance!
(please Cc: me on all responses for this thread; I'm not subscribed)

--
Andrew Boring
Miller Zell Desktop Services
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]> 

"Microsoft DNS service terminates abnormally when it receives a
response to a dns query that was never made. Fix information: run your
DNS service on a different platform." -- bugtraq
http://www.securityfocus.com/archive/1/6212
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