> -----Original Message-----
> From: Paul Blackburn [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]
...
> I suggest to you that AFS RAM cache will beat local filespace
> in terms of speed of access (once the files are in the cache).
I suggest that it all depends. Some OS's do a very good job
using memory to cache the entire local file system. Some OS's
use the paging space for /tmp space. Some OS's can intelligently
cache NFS to local disk. So, it all depends on the specifics.
What I want in AFS is a memory/paging system aware cache, where
the AFS client would use memory as permitted, give it back as
requested due to other demands, and try to never write to local
disk (except for dirty pages that need to be flushed back to the
file server later) in those environments that have high speed
file servers (with some minimum cache tuning knobs in there
somewhere I suppose). One of the limitations of the AFS memory
cache is that its all or nothing. If you have a memory cache,
you cant have a disk cache, and often you simply can't commit
as much memory as you can disk. AIX had (has) a really good
integrated file/memory manager. If AFS could take advantage of
that type of technology on all its platforms that would be
something to see. Its all IBM after all, it isn't like there
are patent issues (just NIH issues). Too bad AFS has been
"functionally stabilized".
Gary
