Is there a way to cache a file system listing?

Theodore Tso tytso at mit.edu
Wed Jun 21 20:39:13 UTC 2006


On Wed, Jun 21, 2006 at 03:15:38PM -0400, Kevin Strong wrote:
> Justin Piszcz wrote:
> >I have a filesystem that has roughly ~600,000 files on it and every 
> >time a new client rsyncs this tree (after 10-20 minutes when the cache 
> >has expired) then it takes 5-10 minutes to re-traverse the tree during 
> >a new rsync.  Is there a way, other than running find /path every 
> >minute or so, to keep the listing in memory so the rsyncs would run 
> >much faster?
>
> I second this.  I am having the same exact issue right now.  Any 
> suggestions would be appreciated.

Are you sure the time is actually re-traversing the tree, and not
calculating the per-file checksums?  Running an rsync server does
present a big load on the server, but traditionally it's not been a
matter of whether or not the directories have been cached, but rather
the fact that rsync doesn't cache the per-file checksums, and has to
recalculate them all each time a new client connects.

						- Ted




More information about the Ext3-users mailing list