Richard wrote:
> Possibly another stupid question but, is this necessary? Is there one?
>
>
simple answer: no and no. Someone will be along soon with the more
complex answer!

Richard illuminated alt.os.linux.ubuntu by typing:
> Possibly another stupid question but, is this necessary? Is there one?

No need to defrag. The ext2/ext3/reiserfs filesystems that are linux
native do all that for you on the fly to a degree.

Hence why there isn't a readily available defrag program.

Here's something that may be of interest if you really must make
ubuntu feel like windows....
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=169551
;-)

--
Moog

"Some mornings it just doesn't seem worth it to gnaw through the
leather straps."

* Richard wrote in alt.os.linux.ubuntu:

> Possibly another stupid question but, is this necessary? Is there one?
>

No, not necessary
http://dataexpedition.com/~sbnoble/T...lesystems.html

--
David

Richard wrote:
> Possibly another stupid question but, is this necessary? Is there one?

http://www.salmar.com/pipermail/wftl...ch/000603.html

All "fragmented" drives are better than "unfragmented" ones on a
multiuser multitasking o/s. The point is that the machine is
doing many things simultaneously, so it has to jump arround even
if one task is interested in only one file. There will be up to a
hundred tasks doing i/o simultaneously.

Yes, all disk drivers use elevator algorithms, in any o/s.

But to answer your question, ext2s spreads blocks out evenly
through the disk, using various strategies (well, a single mixed
strategy).. This reduces the average seek time on a single
elevator pass.

http://www.linuxquestions.org/questi...d.php?t=331862

you don't have to defrag in linux .. the file system is organized
and stored more efficiently than a windows machine. If you really
want to then i can suggest you go to something like
www.google.ca/linux and search for "linux defrag" or something,
and grab a utility .. they do exist, but unnessesary..

--
HPT

No and NO.
"Richard" wrote in message
news:NcadnRCKluvU-33bnZ2dnUVZ8q6unZ2d@bt.com...
> Possibly another stupid question but, is this necessary? Is there one?
>

On Thu, 06 Sep 2007 20:58:18 +0000, SINNER wrote:

> * Richard wrote in alt.os.linux.ubuntu:
>
>> Possibly another stupid question but, is this necessary? Is there one?
>>
>
> No, not necessary
> http://dataexpedition.com/~sbnoble/T...lesystems.html
>

I liked this paragraph:

"The model above was created at a time when disk space was much more
limited and less reliable than today. Storage capacity has grown much more
quickly than the size of most operating systems (except Windows), and hard
drives are inexpensive. Since RAM is also cheap, swap space is used only
as a rare fallback, and so using swap files on the main partition has
become a common practice."

--
Stephan
2003 Yamaha R6

君のこと思い出す日なんてないのは
君のこと忘れたときがないから

"Mountain Mike^^" writes:

> No and NO.

Wrong. Primarily because (a) Linux is not a filesystem and (b) yes,
certain filesystems that work with Linux can and do get fragmented.

Having said that there is probably no reason you would want to bother -
it's not a showstopper in any shape or form.

e2defrag exists for one.

> "Richard" wrote in message
> news:NcadnRCKluvU-33bnZ2dnUVZ8q6unZ2d@bt.com...
>> Possibly another stupid question but, is this necessary? Is there one?
>>

On Thu, 06 Sep 2007 21:42:43 +0100, Richard wrote:

> Possibly another stupid question but, is this necessary? Is there one?

Necessary? Not really.
Is there one? Yes.

Lemme put it this way, my system is used heavily as a development system.
On a daily basis it churns through several hundred source files repeatedly
while I go work on my project, make code changes, etc. So that's a lot of
file IO, object files being created, deleted again, created again, and so
on. Prime candidate for fragmentation.

XP I generally need to defragment every other week at least under those
conditions or I will notice performance drop.

This Ubuntu Install on the other hand is about 4 months old now and hasn't
seen a defrag once nor has it slowed down even the tiniest amount. It's
still the same as it was the first day.

--
Stephan
2003 Yamaha R6

君のこと思い出す日なんてないのは
君のこと忘れたときがないから

Hadron wrote:

> "Mountain Mike^^" writes:
>
>> No and NO.
>
> Wrong. Primarily because (a) Linux is not a filesystem and (b) yes,
> certain filesystems that work with Linux can and do get fragmented.
>
> Having said that there is probably no reason you would want to bother -
> it's not a showstopper in any shape or form.
>
> e2defrag exists for one.
>

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ext3

/quote
There is no online ext3 defragmentation tool working on the filesystem
level. An offline ext2 defragmenter, e2defrag, exists but requires that the
ext3 filesystem be converted back to ext2 first. But depending on the
feature bits turned on on the filesystem, e2defrag may destroy data; it
does not know how to treat many of the newer ext3 features.

There are userspace defragmentation tools like Shake and defrag, which work
by copying each file and hoping the newly allocated file was not
fragmented. However this only works if the filesystem is reasonably empty,
and such filesystems are not usually fragmented. A true defragmentation
tool does not exist for ext3.
/unquote

As usual, the "true linux advocate", "kernel hacker", "emacs
user", "swapfile expert", "X specialist", "CUPS guru", "USB-disk server
admin", "newsreader magician" and "hardware maven" Hadron Quark, aka Hans
Schneider, aka Damian O'Leary tries to tell noobs half the story, and
preferrably the wrong half

Hadron, when will you start to help newbs, instead of trying to destroy
their systems?

"e2defrag" is *old* and should never have been written. Much less should
anyone tell a newb about it, without at the same time telling him *not* to
use it ever
--
The Day Microsoft makes something that does not suck is probably
the day they start making vacuum cleaners.

* Hadron wrote in alt.os.linux.ubuntu:
> "Mountain Mike^^" writes:

>> No and NO.

> Wrong. Primarily because (a) Linux is not a filesystem

Irrelevant. The question was not "Is there a way to defrag Linux?" You
obviously enjoy disagreeing with just about any advice you yourself
haven't given.

--
David
The Usenet Improvement Project: http://blinkynet.net/comp/uip5.html

I have defined the hundred per cent American as ninety-nine per cent an idiot.
-- George Bernard Shaw

On Thu, 06 Sep 2007 21:42:43 +0100, Richard wrote:

> Possibly another stupid question but, is this necessary? Is there one?

No. Probably. I used to accomplish that on Unix systems with 'dump' and
'restore'.

On Thu, 06 Sep 2007 22:00:01 +0000, SINNER wrote:

> * Hadron wrote in alt.os.linux.ubuntu:
>> "Mountain Mike^^" writes:
>
>>> No and NO.
>
>> Wrong. Primarily because (a) Linux is not a filesystem
>
> Irrelevant. The question was not "Is there a way to defrag Linux?"
> You obviously enjoy disagreeing with just about any advice you
> yourself haven't given.

As has been pointed out many times before hadron has reading
comprehension difficulties. It is one of his lesser failings but
certainly one of the most amusing.

It was on, or about, Thu, 06 Sep 2007 21:57:02 +0100, that as I was
halfway through a large jam doughnut, Derek Turner wrote:

> Richard wrote:
>> Possibly another stupid question but, is this necessary? Is there one?
>>
>>
> simple answer: no and no. Someone will be along soon with the more
> complex answer!

Here's why a Linux filesystem does not require to be defragged:-
http://geekblog.oneandoneis2.org/index.php/2006/08/17/
why_doesn_t_linux_need_defragmenting



--
Surely you are not comparing the non-existent Linux (at that time) with
(Windows)98? - Hadron aka Hadron Quark, Hans Schneider, & Damian O'Leary
comp.os.linux.advocacy - Thu, 16 Aug 2007
Message-ID:

On Thu, 06 Sep 2007 16:13:41 -0500, Stephan Rose wrote:


> I liked this paragraph:
>
> "The model above was created at a time when disk space was much more
> limited and less reliable than today. Storage capacity has grown much more
> quickly than the size of most operating systems (except Windows), and hard
> drives are inexpensive. Since RAM is also cheap, swap space is used only
> as a rare fallback, and so using swap files on the main partition has
> become a common practice."
>

I noticed my swap partiton is never used. I have 2gb of ram. Then why did
the Ubuntu install default to creating a 3gb swap partition if it is never
used?

Juarez schreef:
> On Thu, 06 Sep 2007 16:13:41 -0500, Stephan Rose wrote:
>
>
>> I liked this paragraph:
>>
>> "The model above was created at a time when disk space was much more
>> limited and less reliable than today. Storage capacity has grown much more
>> quickly than the size of most operating systems (except Windows), and hard
>> drives are inexpensive. Since RAM is also cheap, swap space is used only
>> as a rare fallback, and so using swap files on the main partition has
>> become a common practice."
>>
>
> I noticed my swap partiton is never used. I have 2gb of ram. Then why did
> the Ubuntu install default to creating a 3gb swap partition if it is never
> used?

Because 'it' has to cater for all kinds of users, not just you.
Some applications use a lot of RAM, some users leave a lot of
applications open.
These are all reasons why you might run out of free RAM, would there at
such a moment not be a swap available the system would crash.
But you are free to use the swap for other things, with the price of HD
space at about 50 cents (Dollar or euro) per GB a dubious endeavour.

p5000011 writes:

> On Thu, 06 Sep 2007 22:00:01 +0000, SINNER wrote:
>
>> * Hadron wrote in alt.os.linux.ubuntu:
>>> "Mountain Mike^^" writes:
>>
>>>> No and NO.
>>
>>> Wrong. Primarily because (a) Linux is not a filesystem
>>
>> Irrelevant. The question was not "Is there a way to defrag Linux?"
>> You obviously enjoy disagreeing with just about any advice you
>> yourself haven't given.
>
> As has been pointed out many times before hadron has reading
> comprehension difficulties. It is one of his lesser failings but
> certainly one of the most amusing.

Nice snipping. What IS wrong with some of you?

I pointed out that Linux itself can have MANY different file
systems. Some do get fragmented to a certain degree. Ask a certain Mr
Koehlmann who disputed that it is "easy" to create a contiguous file.

Defraggers have and do exist depending on the file system and the
versions used.

Linux file systems do fragment.

Now, for some reason you chose to snip this bit of my reply:

,----
| Having said that there is probably no reason you would want to bother -
| it's not a showstopper in any shape or form.
|
| e2defrag exists for one.
`----

SINNER seems to sugar coat his replies. I think people should get the
facts. Above are the facts. A blanket "no and no" is, quite simply,
dishonest. But as is very clear from the original reply that I made
above I did point out that the fragmentation is unlikely necessary to be
required.

Juarez wrote:

> On Thu, 06 Sep 2007 16:13:41 -0500, Stephan Rose wrote:
>
>
>> I liked this paragraph:
>>
>> "The model above was created at a time when disk space was much more
>> limited and less reliable than today. Storage capacity has grown much
>> more quickly than the size of most operating systems (except Windows),
>> and hard drives are inexpensive. Since RAM is also cheap, swap space is
>> used only as a rare fallback, and so using swap files on the main
>> partition has become a common practice."
>>
>
> I noticed my swap partiton is never used. I have 2gb of ram. Then why did
> the Ubuntu install default to creating a 3gb swap partition if it is never
> used?

If you were to hibernate your computer, the contents of your RAM would be
dumped to the swap. It has to be large enough to at least accomodate your
existing RAM, plus some additional for when swapping is normally required.

Cheers.

--

Proprietary Software: a 20th Century software business model.
Intelligent and helpful Windoze error messages: http://tinyurl.com/2ks5dz

* Hadron wrote in alt.os.linux.ubuntu:

> SINNER seems to sugar coat his replies. I think people should get the
> facts. Above are the facts. A blanket "no and no" is, quite simply,
> dishonest.

But I didnt give that answer AND I offered a link to back up my claim, you
gave what exactly? Nice insuation there though.

> But as is very clear from the original reply that I made
> above I did point out that the fragmentation is unlikely necessary to be
> required.

Simply because you felt you had to reply becasue no one else said the same
thing right? Wrong, tat very answer IE NO was already given, you added
nothing.

Your an ass that changes your tune daily. First I am too harsh, now I sugar
coat. Take your meds. The answer you gave was already given but you needed
to be Big Man on Campus.

--
David

Stephan Rose wrote:
> On Thu, 06 Sep 2007 21:42:43 +0100, Richard wrote:
>
>> Possibly another stupid question but, is this necessary? Is there
>> one?
>
> Necessary? Not really.
> Is there one? Yes.
>
> Lemme put it this way, my system is used heavily as a development
> system. On a daily basis it churns through several hundred source
> files repeatedly while I go work on my project, make code changes,
> etc. So that's a lot of file IO, object files being created, deleted
> again, created again, and so on. Prime candidate for fragmentation.
>
> XP I generally need to defragment every other week at least under
> those conditions or I will notice performance drop.
>
> This Ubuntu Install on the other hand is about 4 months old now and
> hasn't seen a defrag once nor has it slowed down even the tiniest
> amount. It's still the same as it was the first day.

Is there a tool to graphically visualise potential fragmentation on Linux
file systems, e.g. take my ext3 for example? Not that I doubt the fact that
fragmentation is a non-issue, but some hard proof never hurts.

--
Carsten A. Arnholm
http://arnholm.org/
N59.776 E10.457