nolargefiles in fstab

[Fred Martin_1]

Here are two lines from my /etc/fstab file:

/dev/vg02/lvol2 /dump vxfs rw,suid,nolargefiles,delaylog,datainlog 0 2
/dev/vg04/lvol1 /backup vxfs rw,suid,largefiles,delaylog,datainlog 0 2

Can someone tell me the significance of the 'largefiles' and 'nolargefiles' entries?

[Patrick Wallek · Accepted solution]

nolargefiles means that you can't have files larger than 2GB in the filesystem.

largefiles means you can have files larger than 2GB.

[Bryan D. Quinn]

nolargefiles will not allow files bigger than 2GB

largefiles will allow files bigger than 2GB, up to 128GB.

-Bryan

[Fred Martin_1]

I guess that was too easy :) ... is there any overhead considerations? I mean, it seems like I would just want them all be 'large' so I could sleep nights. But is there a cost?

[Steven E. Protter]

If you ever see a 11.11 system, you'll see that largefiles is no longer an option in /etc/fstab

You just do it with newfs or extendfs and its recognized at mount time.

SEP

[Patrick Wallek]

No there is not any additional overhead when largefiles is enabled.

Consider the filesystems though. I never enable largefiles on any of the basic OS filesystems and never any filesystems that are less than 2GB in size. In fact I usually only enable largefiles if it is specifically requested. That way I don't have someone, myself included, accidentally fill up a file system with 1 VERY LARGE file.

Also keep in mind that if you do want to enable largefiles, you must turn it on for the filesystem via the fsadm command and then modify the /etc/fstab. Otherwise, you will get an error when you try to mount it.

# fsadm -o largefiles /mount_point

Or if you are createing a new filesystem, enable largefiles when you newfs the filesystem.

# newfs -F vxfs -o largefiles /dev/vg??/rlvol??