An Introduction to ZFS
So has anyone here used zfs and btrfs and would like to comment on the differences? I've been on a heavy zfs kick lately, but the performance loss is hard to stomach and the only research I found points to btrfs being faster (though of course they both take a hit).<p>Basically the reasons I'm drawn to zfs are:<p>- checksumming & self-healing<p>- ergonomics & flexibility of managing pools with zfs<p>- copy on write for cheap local copy/experimentation (i.e. just clone your DB folder and you have a new DB)<p>- zfs send/recv for very efficient incremental backups<p>From what I can find it seems like btrfs does all that, and faster[0]. In addition to being faster, it also is in-kernel[1], and more flexible for the user in various ways, for example allowing resizing[2]. Looking around btrfs may not be blessed as stable but there are a lot of big orgs using it.<p>All that said, there are articles like this one[3] which are somewhat dated but paint ZFS really positively from a maintenance point of view. Very hard to pick between these two.<p>I'd really like to use ZFS -- the community seems very welcoming and amazing but I'm a little worried about picking the wrong tool for the job.<p>[EDIT] - there's also this old comparison from phoronix[1] which is confusing. I'm still learning towards ZFS but sure would like to hear some strong opinions if anyone has em.<p>[0]: <a href="https://www.diva-portal.org/smash/get/diva2:822493/FULLTEXT01.pdf" rel="nofollow">https://www.diva-portal.org/smash/get/diva2:822493/FULLTEXT0...</a><p>[1]: <a href="https://btrfs.wiki.kernel.org/index.php/FAQ#Is_btrfs_stable.3F" rel="nofollow">https://btrfs.wiki.kernel.org/index.php/FAQ#Is_btrfs_stable....</a><p>[2]: <a href="https://markmcb.com/2020/01/07/five-years-of-btrfs/" rel="nofollow">https://markmcb.com/2020/01/07/five-years-of-btrfs/</a><p>[3]: <a href="https://rudd-o.com/linux-and-free-software/ways-in-which-zfs-is-better-than-btrfs" rel="nofollow">https://rudd-o.com/linux-and-free-software/ways-in-which-zfs...</a><p>[4]: <a href="https://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=article&item=freebsd-12-zfs&num=2" rel="nofollow">https://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=article&item=freebsd-...</a>