After handling a request, a sync read thread polls its /dev/fuse fd for
up to fuse-read-spin-us microseconds before blocking in read(). Default
0 (disabled). Measured at 50us (tmpfs branch, direct_io): sequential
128K/1M reads +27-32%, 128K writes +14%, metadata walks +24-32%; no
change on 8 parallel streams or 1M writes. Costs roughly one core on a
busy-but-quiet mount, nothing when idle.
Describe why mergerfs does not aggregate branch performance like
RAID/ZFS (whose aggregate throughput is also capped by shared
interconnects) and instead provides independent per-branch
performance: best case A+B+C across concurrent streams, worst case
single-stream limited to one branch's speed.
- Store cloned read-worker fds on fuse_session and close them there.
- Set up clone fallback through session helpers used by the loop.
- Carry per-request fds through receive, process, and reply paths.
Tests show significant performance increases in highly concurrent
workloads on a high core count system. Upto 15% better on reads and
27% on writes.
- Expose the ioprio enabled flag as an atomic for relaxed inline checks
- Inline SetFrom construction so disabled read/write paths avoid a function call
- Move priority application into a slow helper used only when ioprio is enabled
- Guard fuse_cfg_t log file and filepath shared pointers with a shared mutex
- Replace atomic shared pointer loads and stores with shared and unique locks
- Replace atomic shared pointer loads/stores with shared/unique locking.
- Store the configured readdir mode directly as std::string.
- Copy the active ReadDir implementation under lock before invoking it.
- Use relaxed increment under the map bucket lock when duplicating file handles.
- Use acq_rel decrement when releasing and checking for final references.
- Load moved ref_count with relaxed ordering during map insertion.
- Explain that the mutex is per readdir call.
- Document that only dirent deduplication and list append are serialized.
- Clarify that per-branch opendir and getdents64 work runs outside the critical section.
- Replace the per-file Mutex with std::shared_mutex for shared write access.
- Run direct and cached writes under a shared lock while the fd is stable.
- Retry failed writes under a unique lock before move-on-ENOSPC relocation.
- Add helpers that release path locks and update node state under f.lock.
- Update getattr and setattr stat-cache invalidation while preserving ESTALE handling.
- Rework create, open, tmpfile, and set_path_info to mutate lookup/open state under the shared lock.
- Document the lock/unlock pair as an acquire/release barrier.
- Explain that releasedir waits for in-flight readdir calls before destroy/free.
- Warn against removing the synchronization despite it not being a critical section.
Important changes:
- Switch mergerfs and vendored libfuse Makefiles to -std=c++20.
- Select the latest available GCC/G++ or toolset in container builds.
- Verify compiler C++20 support during package installation.
- Fix dynamic SysLog formatting for fmt C++20 checks.
- Add mergerfs_mount() context manager in posix_parity.py that creates
temporary branch dirs in tests/.test_tmp/, mounts an ephemeral mergerfs
instance, and cleans up after use.
- Add find_mergerfs(), find_fusermount(), mount_mergerfs(), unmount_mergerfs()
helpers.
- Update run-tests to invoke each TEST_* script without a mountpoint arg.
- Update README.md to document the new `python3 tests/run-tests` invocation.
- Fix 44 tests to use mergerfs_mount() instead of expecting a pre-mounted path.
- Add tempfile import to 10 tests that were missing it.
- Fix TEST_mount_lifecycle to use mergerfs_mount() context manager.
- Fix TEST_posix_tmpfile missing join import.
- Fix TEST_cfg_xattr_modes error message framing (no "(known bug)").
- Fix TEST_posix_copy_file_range: loop-copy full size, compare st_size and
SHA256 hash; add NativeTmp for space management; route native temp to
tests/.test_tmp/ to avoid ENOSPC on /tmp.
- Fix TEST_posix_getattr_fgetattr: st_cmp skips st_size for dirs; add
compare_ino param for safe inode comparison when inodecalc=passthrough.
- Fix TEST_unlink_rename, TEST_use_* tests: namespace cleanup, consistent
variable naming, None check for cmpfunc.
- Fix TEST_readlink_semantics: remove type annotations to support older
Python; wrap in mergerfs_mount() try/except.
- Add flush=True to run-tests print so test names show immediately.
- Fix typo in static.installer: /pkg/ -> /pkgs/
- Add missing mkdir -p /build before makeself
- Mount pkgs directory via podman build -v so static.installer can access
previously built static tarballs without relying on bind mounts relative
to the build context
- Register qemu-user-static binfmt handlers for cross-compilation
- Make --git-repo optional when using --setup
- Reserve a zero stat CRC to represent an invalid cache fingerprint.
- Include device, size, inode, mtime, and ctime data in the fingerprint.
- Recompute the fingerprint during auto-cache open before keeping cache.
- Make the test runner fail on failed tests and report explicit skips
- Strengthen assertions for O_DIRECT, LUP policy, EXDEV fallback, and xattrs
- Fix cleanup and file descriptor handling across test scripts
No functional change: libfuse/helper.cpp (fuse_daemonize,
fuse_helper_opt_proc, fuse_parse_cmdline) and mergerfs
fuse_init.cpp (_want helpers) reformatted to match the project's
GNU-style brace placement and aligned parameter lists.
- fuse_opt: reformat process_opt_param to project style; return the
rv from sscanf through a named local so the error branch prints
the failing option cleanly.
- cpu.cpp: when parsing /sys/devices/system/cpu/*/topology/core_id,
bail out cleanly on stream read failure rather than recording an
uninitialized core_id.
- fusermount: free(copy) on the success path of parsing the mount
option (previously leaked on every mount), and replace the fixed-
buffer sprintf into procfile with snprintf bounded by the buffer
size.
- maintenance_thread: widen the iteration count from int to u64
so a long-lived daemon doesn't wrap after ~68 years of ticks
(real effect: silence signed-overflow warnings under UBSan).
- ThreadPool::destroy used to iterate _threads directly while another
thread could be adjusting the same vector. Snapshot the vector
under the mutex and iterate the local copy for pthread_cancel /
pthread_join.
- ObjPool::construct now returns NULL when the pooled allocator
returns NULL instead of invoking placement-new on a null
pointer. In destroy, compute to_node(obj) before running the
destructor - the destructor may scrub bytes the to_node helper
reads.
- In the async/sync workers in fuse_loop, msgbuf_alloc can return
NULL under memory pressure. Fail the worker cleanly with a
diagnostic rather than dereferencing. Also introduce a small
_nproc() helper that treats hardware_concurrency()==0 as 1, so
the downstream min/max arithmetic doesn't produce a zero thread
count.
The signal handler reads the global session pointer from an async-
signal context while another thread installs/removes the session
via set/remove_signal_handlers. Use std::atomic<fuse_session*> with
acquire/release ordering so the handler either sees NULL or a fully
published session, never a torn pointer.
Collapse get_node/get_node_nocheck into a single function that
returns NULL when the node is absent rather than abort()ing.
Callers that previously assumed non-NULL now check the return value
and either reply ESTALE/ENOMEM or fall through gracefully; a few
places where the node is load-bearing (e.g. unhash during remove)
use fatal::abort with a descriptive message.
Switch mutex_lock / mutex_unlock pairs to mutex_lockguard so early
returns on error paths no longer leak the lock, and add NULL-safety
around fuse_dh in readdir/readdir_plus, fuse_dirents_init error
returns, the getattr path when both name and fh are empty, and the
msgbuf allocation in fuse_lib_read.
Pull the new xstrdup/xmalloc wrappers from xalloc.hpp for the root
node name so the common-case OOM path terminates with a diagnostic
instead of a silent corrupted node.
Also guard fuse_session_destroy against a NULL session - called
from error-recovery paths.
The low-level init/destroy callbacks were passed a userdata pointer
that mergerfs never consumed - the caller threaded it through
fuse_lowlevel_new only to hand it back unchanged. Remove the
parameter from the ops struct, from fuse_lowlevel_new(_common),
and from the internal fuse_ll struct; update fuse_lib_init and
fuse_lib_destroy accordingly.
Also drop fuse_reply_ioctl_iov: no caller in-tree invokes it and
the public API is defined by this vendored libfuse fork.
libfuse previously initialized its debug log filepath to
"/dev/stderr", forcing the config layer to reopen stderr on every
load whether or not the user asked for it. Default the libfuse log
path to "" and have the mergerfs config layer only forward the
request to libfuse when the user supplied an explicit path.
Both helpers previously called strcmp/pointer-dereference directly
on their arguments, so a stray NULL (e.g. an unset env string or an
absent xattr) crashed the process. Guard both helpers: same()
returns true only if both pointers are equal, startswith() returns
false if either side is NULL.
The create policy can legitimately return success with an empty
destination list (e.g. every candidate rejected). Previously we
then dereferenced dst_branch[0] and faulted. Return -ENOSPC so the
original write that triggered the move propagates a sensible errno
to userspace.
The branch-aggregation code computed
blocks * f_frsize / min_frsize
as u64 arithmetic. With large filesystems the intermediate product
blocks * f_frsize overflows 64 bits long before the division can
bring the result back into range, producing garbage bavail/bfree
values reported to userspace.
Compute the scale factor once in long double and multiply each
count by it, so the only narrowing happens in the final cast back
to fsblkcnt_t.
Old code only null-terminated when the returned/copied length was
strictly less than the caller-supplied bufsize_, leaving the buffer
unterminated on an exact-fill. Since buf_ is consumed as a C string,
reserve one byte for the terminator up front and unconditionally
terminate.
- ReadDir::_initialized is set by the first thread through the
lazy-init path and read by every subsequent caller; make it
std::atomic<bool> so the read/write pair has a happens-before
relationship.
- The 'no valid mergerfs branch found' error directory entry used
strcpy into a fixed-size dirent buffer. The message happens to
fit today but the buffer is only NAME_MAX wide; switch to a
length-bounded strncpy driven by the constexpr string size.
- The getdents implementations for seq/cor/cosr allocated a msgbuf
without checking for allocation failure and then dereferenced it.
Return -ENOMEM when the allocation fails.
The fake-root and control-file fast paths returned a synthetic stat
without touching the timeout struct. Callers that took those paths
ended up sending whatever the timeout struct happened to hold,
which is uninitialized memory for the control-file path and
whatever a prior call left there for the fake-root path. Kernel
behavior is undefined when the timeout is garbage.
Pass timeout_ into both helpers and set entry/attr from the
configured cache values.
Previously most FUSE ops took a reference to the live cfg.branches
object. With atomic_load now producing a shared_ptr snapshot, pass
it by value: the op works against a single stable view of the
configuration for its whole lifetime, immune to concurrent
reconfiguration.
Also bail out with -ENOENT when the policy returns an empty branch
set rather than dereferencing branches[0]. This was reachable if a
policy rejected every branch (e.g. everything readonly while
looking for a writable target).
Covers access, chmod, chown, create, getattr, getxattr, ioctl,
link, listxattr, mkdir, mknod, open, readdir (cor/cosr),
readlink, removexattr, rename, rmdir, setxattr, statfs, statx,
symlink, truncate, unlink, utimens.
While here, in _getattr only dereference st_->st_mode when lstat
succeeded (it is otherwise uninitialized).
Several FUSE ops fell back to looking up a FileInfo via
state.open_files when the kernel-provided fh was zero, returning
-ENOENT if the lookup failed. This path papered over handle-tracking
bugs and added cost on every call. Use the handle directly and
return -EBADF when it is invalid - the kernel should always hand us
a valid fh for an open resource.
Also simplify FileInfo::from_fh / DirInfo::from_fh and their to_fh
helpers: callers now handle the null-pointer case explicitly so the
ASSERT_NOT_NULL checks are redundant.
Covers fallocate, fchmod, fchown, fgetattr, flock, ftruncate,
futimens, read, release, releasedir, write, statx, ioctl (file +
dir), readdir (sequential, concurrent-on-read,
concurrent-on-search), and the passthrough fast paths in
create/open.
Branches using the default minfreespace held a reference to their
owning Impl's _default_minfreespace. After a copy or move the
pointer still referenced the source Impl, which could become
invalid or diverge after further configuration changes. Switch to
a pointer and re-link it to the destination Impl on copy/move.
While here, convert set_branch_mode to do an atomic_store of a
newly constructed Impl rather than mutating the shared pointer
target in place. Readers holding an atomic_load snapshot are no
longer affected by a concurrent mode change.
ref_count is read and written from multiple FUSE worker threads
during open/release. Make it std::atomic<int> and provide a move
constructor so OpenFile remains movable when the underlying atomic
is non-movable.
rwlock.hpp was left over after migrating to atomic shared pointers
for branches configuration. No code references ReadGuard/WriteGuard
any longer, so drop the header and its stale includes.
Use __builtin_mul_overflow to detect overflow when applying size
suffixes (K, M, G, T) in str::from for int64_t and uint64_t. Previously,
large values with suffixes could silently wrap around.
Run in an elevated credential mode (root) and let the kernel manage
entitlements. Will result in slightly different behavior but should
not be noticed by most.
On 32 bit platforms tv_nsec is a signed long while the FUSE setattr
arguments provide nanoseconds as uint32_t. C++17 treats uint32_t -> long
in a brace initializer as a narrowing conversion and rejects it on ILP32
targets. This surfaced when building on FreeBSD i386 with clang 19 where
the compiler refused the list initialization of struct timespec.
Add explicit static_cast<long>() for the nsec fields to make the
conversion intentional and portable. This avoids build failures on i386
while leaving 64 bit builds unchanged.
Add conditional includes for extended attribute support. FreeBSD uses
<sys/extattr.h> instead of <sys/xattr.h>, which prevents the preload
module from building. This update selects the proper header based on
the target platform and fixes the build failure on FreeBSD.
* Allow empty lines in config files
* Add example comment to ini example in docs/quickstart.md
---------
Co-authored-by: Max-F-Helm <m7t24zklr@relay.firefox.com>
Also have special error handling for when branches are invalid and
ENOENT would be returned for getattr and readdir so users understand
what is going on and the runtime interface can still be used to fix
the problem.
* Use concurrent_flat_map to build a global cache rather than per
thread.
* Create global maintanence thread manager for clearing unused cache
entries.
* category.create=pfrd
* moveonenospc=pfrd
* cache.files=off
* parallel-direct-writes=true
These changes were made to match the recommended settings for most
users to reduce confusion.
This makes it clear, along with the previous commit, that per-process will allow
us to use parallel direct writes as they will mount with the equivalent
of cache.files=off (i.e. direct_io)
Clarify that paralell direct can only be enabled where the kernel
version supports it, which is 6.2+.
State the two cache.files modes which can support parallel direct writes
in the description.
After numerous tests it was found the splice features were at best
the same performance as standard IO and at worse actually slower.
To simplify the code all splice features are removed.
mergerfs tries to pass through ioctl calls but due to the complexity
of btrfs calls their is risk of segfaults. In the future it may be
required to whitelist all supported ioctl calls.
* Replace the stat values with a crc32b of them instead (for auto-cache)
* Replace char flag with bitfield
* Remove node generation. nodeid is an unsigned 64bit int. Would take 500K+ years
to rollover at 1M nodes per second.
* Remove request interrupt code. Required tracking of all requests unnecesssarily.
* Remove all debugging printing. Have plans to do full replacement.
* Remove deprecated functions.
* Remove unneeded error checking.
* Remove "userdata" which was unused.
* Remove allow_root feature.
While they were going to be the new way of interacting with the runtime config
I've decided to use toml based config for mergerfs v3. In that case all updates
will happen through the config file and ioctl will only be used to load/reload
the config rather than a key:value like API.
* follow-symlinks: allows mergerfs to transparently follow symlinks
* link-exdev: in the event a link returns EXDEV create a symlink instead
* rename-exdev: in the event a rename returns EXDEV move the oldpath and
create a symlink for the newpath
chmod, chown, removexattr, setxattr, truncate, utimens:
* if no errors: return 0
* if no successes: return first error
* if file acted on was the same as related search function: return its value
* return 0
rmdir, unlink:
* if no errors: return 0
* return first error
Percentage Free Random Distribution
Chooses a random branch based on the available space percentage free.
IE: if branch A has 1G free and branch B has 2G then B should be chosen
twice as often.
wyhash has very good performance for small keys (our usecase) and
works on platforms with alignment concerns.
A user had an issue where fasthash64 lead to misaligned reads and
signal exceptions. wyhash does not have such issues and is faster.
Like path preserving but walks back the path till a match is found. Should
cover the usecase where someone wants a "less strict" form of path
preservation.
Just like functions you can now set a policy for moveonfreenospc. This
allows for more flexibility.
For backwards compatibility moveonfreenospc=true is converted to
moveonfreenospc=mfs.
minfreespace does apply which is slightly different from original behavior.
This removes the risk of corrupted data being sent back to the kernel
should it use the offset from one opendir-readdir in another. In this case
it would at most skip dirents.
According to the standards the offset is only valid when used within
the opendir -> releasedir but NFS uses offsets across independent
calls.
Linux 4.20 and above allow setting the number of pages per FUSE message
upto 256 (4K * 256 = 1MiB). This can greatly increase read and write
speeds depending on the workload.
addresses #521
mergerfs is written using libfuse's high level API. The HLAPI forces a certain
behavior with regard to unlinking or rename overwriting of open files. It
renames the file to .fuse_hiddenXXXXXX and when incoming requests refer
to the unlinked file it will use path based calls and use that path.
This behavior leads to rmdirs failing or some software noticing
the .fuse_hidden files.
This patch changes the HLAPI and removes entirely the .fuse_hidden behavior.
See the README for more.
`defaults` is a value used by all filesystems and isn't passed through to
mergerfs when mounting via the fstab or the mount command. This led
to inconsistent application of options. atomic_o_trunc, big_writes, and
default_permissions should be enabled all the time anyway and splice_*
can lead to issues so they are not always enabled.
about:When you're looking for information or general support
title:''
labels:investigating, question
assignees:''
---
For general questions and support please use [GitHub Discussions](https://github.com/trapexit/mergerfs/discussions) or [Discord](https://discord.gg/MpAr69V).
> Explicitly list **all** steps to reproduce. Preferably create a minimal example of the problem using standard command line tools. The more variables (apps, settings, etc.) that are involved the more difficult it is to debug. Also, **please** be sure to have read all of the README. It contains a lot of information regarding known system and user issues.
System information
==================
Please provide as much of the following information as possible:
* [ ] mergerfs version: `mergerfs -V`
* [ ] mergerfs settings: `cat /etc/fstab` or the command line arguments
* [ ] Linux version: `uname -a`
* [ ] Versions of any additional software being used
* [ ] List of drives, filesystems, & sizes: `df -h`
* [ ] strace of application having problem: `strace -f -o /tmp/app.strace.txt <cmd>` or `strace -f -p <appPID> -o /tmp/app.strace.txt`
* [ ] strace of mergerfs while app tried to do it's thing: `strace -f -p <mergerfsPID> -o /tmp/mergerfs.strace.txt`
**mergerfs** is a union filesystem geared towards simplifying storage and management of files across numerous commodity storage devices. It is similar to **mhddfs**, **unionfs**, and **aufs**.
# FEATURES
* Runs in userspace (FUSE)
* Configurable behaviors
* Logically combine numerous filesystems/paths into a single
mount point (JBOFS: Just a Bunch of FileSystems)
* Combine paths of the same or different filesystems
* Ability to add or remove filesystems/paths without impacting the
rest of the data
* Unaffected by individual filesystem failure
* Configurable file selection and creation placement
* Handling of writes to full drives (transparently move file to drive with capacity)
* Handles pool of readonly and read/write drives
* Turn read-only files into symlinks to increase read performance
*Support for POSIX ACLs
# How it works
mergerfs logically merges multiple paths together. Think a union of sets. The file/s or directory/s acted on or presented through mergerfs are based on the policy chosen for that particular action. Read more about policies below.
## Non-features
* Read/write overlay on top of read-only filesystem like OverlayFS
* File whiteout
* RAID like parity calculation (see [SnapRAID](https://www.snapraid.it))
* Redundancy
* Splitting of files across branches
## How it works
mergerfs logically merges multiple filesystem paths together. Not
block devices, not filesystem mounts, just paths. It acts as a proxy
to the underlying filesystem paths. Combining the behaviors of some
functions and being a selector for others.
When the contents of a directory are requested mergerfs combines the
list of files from each directory, deduplicating entries, and returns
that list.
When a file or directory is created a policy is first run to determine
which branch will be selected for the creation.
For functions which change attributes or remove the file the behavior
may be applied to all instances found.
The way in which mergerfs behaves is controlled by the
[config/options/settings](https://trapexit.github.io/mergerfs/latest/config/options). More
mergerfs does **not** support the copy-on-write (CoW) behavior found in **aufs** and **overlayfs**. You can **not** mount a read-only filesystem and write to it. However, mergerfs will ignore read-only drives when creating new files so you can mix rw and ro drives.
* **defaults**: a shortcut for FUSE's **atomic_o_trunc**, **auto_cache**, **big_writes**, **default_permissions**, **splice_move**, **splice_read**, and **splice_write**. These options seem to provide the best performance.
* **allow_other**: a libfuse option which allows users besides the one which ran mergerfs to see the filesystem. This is required for most use-cases.
* **direct_io**: causes FUSE to bypass caching which can increase write speeds at the detriment of reads. Note that not enabling `direct_io` will cause double caching of files and therefore less memory for caching generally (enable **dropcacheonclose** to help with this problem). However, `mmap` does not work when `direct_io` is enabled.
* **minfreespace=value**: the minimum space value used for creation policies. Understands 'K', 'M', and 'G' to represent kilobyte, megabyte, and gigabyte respectively. (default: 4G)
* **moveonenospc=true|false**: when enabled (set to **true**) if a **write** fails with **ENOSPC** or **EDQUOT** a scan of all drives will be done looking for the drive with the most free space which is at least the size of the file plus the amount which failed to write. An attempt to move the file to that drive will occur (keeping all metadata possible) and if successful the original is unlinked and the write retried. (default: false)
* **use_ino**: causes mergerfs to supply file/directory inodes rather than libfuse. While not a default it is generally recommended it be enabled so that hard linked files share the same inode value.
* **hard_remove**: force libfuse to immedately remove files when unlinked. This will keep the `.fuse_hidden` files from showing up but if software uses an opened but unlinked file in certain ways it could result in errors.
* **dropcacheonclose=true|false**: when a file is requested to be closed call `posix_fadvise` on it first to instruct the kernel that we no longer need the data and it can drop its cache. Recommended when **direct_io** is not enabled to limit double caching. (default: false)
* **symlinkify=true|false**: when enabled (set to **true**) and a file is not writable and its mtime or ctime is older than **symlinkify_timeout** files will be reported as symlinks to the original files. Please read more below before using. (default: false)
* **symlinkify_timeout=value**: time to wait, in seconds, to activate the **symlinkify** behavior. (default: 3600)
* **nullrw=true|false**: turns reads and writes into no-ops. The request will succeed but do nothing. Useful for benchmarking mergerfs. (default: false)
* **ignorepponrename=true|false**: ignore path preserving on rename. Typically rename and link act differently depending on the policy of `create` (read below). Enabling this will cause rename and link to always use the non-path preserving behavior. This means files, when renamed or linked, will stay on the same drive. (default: false)
* **security_capability=true|false**: If false return ENOATTR when xattr security.capability is queried. (default: true)
* **xattr=passthrough|noattr|notsup**: Runtime control of xattrs. Default is to passthrough xattr requests. 'noattr' will short circuit as if nothing exists. 'notsup' will respond with ENOTSUP as if xattrs are not supported or disabled. (default: passthrough)
* **link_cow=true|false**: When enabled if a regular file is opened which has a link count > 1 it will copy the file to a temporary file and rename over the original. Breaking the link and providing a basic copy-on-write function similar to cow-shell. (default: false)
* **statfs=base|full**: Controls how statfs works. 'base' means it will always use all branches in statfs calculations. 'full' is in effect path preserving and only includes drives where the path exists. (default: base)
* **statfs_ignore=none|ro|nc**: 'ro' will cause statfs calculations to ignore available space for branches mounted or tagged as 'read only' or 'no create'. 'nc' will ignore available space for branches tagged as 'no create'. (default: none)
* **threads=num**: number of threads to use in multithreaded mode. When set to zero (the default) it will attempt to discover and use the number of logical cores. If the lookup fails it will fall back to using 4. If the thread count is set negative it will look up the number of cores then divide by the absolute value. ie. threads=-2 on an 8 core machine will result in 8 / 2 = 4 threads. There will always be at least 1 thread. NOTE: higher number of threads increases parallelism but usually decreases throughput. (default: number of cores) *NOTE2:* the option is unavailable when built with system libfuse.
* **fsname=name**: sets the name of the filesystem as seen in **mount**, **df**, etc. Defaults to a list of the source paths concatenated together with the longest common prefix removed.
* **func.<func>=<policy>**: sets the specific FUSE function's policy. See below for the list of value types. Example: **func.getattr=newest**
* **category.<category>=<policy>**: Sets policy of all FUSE functions in the provided category. Example: **category.create=mfs**
**NOTE:** Options are evaluated in the order listed so if the options are **func.rmdir=rand,category.action=ff** the **action** category setting will override the **rmdir** setting.
## Documentation
### branches
https://trapexit.github.io/mergerfs
The 'branches' (formerly 'srcmounts') argument is a colon (':') delimited list of paths to be pooled together. It does not matter if the paths are on the same or different drives nor does it matter the filesystem. Used and available space will not be duplicated for paths on the same device and any features which aren't supported by the underlying filesystem (such as file attributes or extended attributes) will return the appropriate errors.
To make it easier to include multiple branches mergerfs supports [globbing](http://linux.die.net/man/7/glob). **The globbing tokens MUST be escaped when using via the shell else the shell itself will apply the glob itself.**
## Support
Each branch can have a suffix of `=RW` (read / write), `=RO` (read only), or `=NC` (no create). These suffixes work with globs as well and will apply to each path found. `RW` is the default behavior and those paths will be eligible for all policy categories. `RO` will exclude those paths from `create` and `action` policies (just as a filesystem being mounted `ro` would). `NC` will exclude those paths from `create` policies (you can't create but you can change / delete).
Development and support of a project like mergerfs requires a
significant amount of time and effort. The software is released under
the very liberal [ISC](https://opensource.org/license/isc-license-txt)
license and is therefore free to use for personal or commercial uses.
**NOTE:** the globbing is done at mount or xattr update time (see below). If a new directory is added matching the glob after the fact it will not be automatically included.
If you are a non-commercial user and find mergerfs and its support valuable
and would like to support the project financially it would be very
much appreciated.
**NOTE:** for mounting via **fstab** to work you must have **mount.fuse** installed. For Ubuntu/Debian it is included in the**fuse** package.
### symlinkify
Due to the levels of indirection introduced by mergerfs and the underlying technology FUSE there can be varying levels of performance degredation. This feature will turn non-directories which are not writable into symlinks to the original file found by the `readlink` policy after the mtime and ctime are older than the timeout.
**WARNING:** The current implementation has a known issue in which if the file is open and being used when the file is converted to a symlink then the application which has that file open will receive an error when using it. This is unlikely to occur in practice but is something to keep in mind.
**WARNING:** Some backup solutions, such as CrashPlan, do not backup the target of a symlink. If using this feature it will be necessary to point any backup software to the original drives or configure the software to follow symlinks if such an option is available. Alternatively create two mounts. One for backup and one for general consumption.
### nullrw
Due to how FUSE works there is an overhead to all requests made to a FUSE filesystem. Meaning that even a simple passthrough will have some slowdown. However, generally the overhead is minimal in comparison to the cost of the underlying I/O. By disabling the underlying I/O we can test the theoretical performance boundries.
By enabling `nullrw` mergerfs will work as it always does **except** that all reads and writes will be no-ops. A write will succeed (the size of the write will be returned as if it were successful) but mergerfs does nothing with the data it was given. Similarly a read will return the size requested but won't touch the buffer.
It's important to test with different `obs` (output block size) values since the relative overhead is greater with smaller values. As you can see above the size of a read or write can massively impact theoretical performance. If an application performs much worse through mergerfs it could very well be that it doesn't optimally size its read and write requests.
### xattr
Runtime extended attribute support can be managed via the `xattr` option. By default it will passthrough any xattr calls. Given xattr support is rarely used and can have significant performance implications mergerfs allows it to be disabled at runtime.
`noattr` will cause mergerfs to short circuit all xattr calls and return ENOATTR where appropriate. mergerfs still gets all the requests but they will not be forwarded on to the underlying filesystems. The runtime control will still function in this mode.
`notsup` will cause mergerfs to return ENOTSUP for any xattr call. The difference with `noattr` is that the kernel will cache this fact and itself short circuit future calls. This will be more efficient than `noattr` but will cause mergerfs' runtime control via the hidden file to stop working.
# FUNCTIONS / POLICIES / CATEGORIES
The POSIX filesystem API has a number of functions. **creat**, **stat**, **chown**, etc. In mergerfs these functions are grouped into 3 categories: **action**, **create**, and **search**. Functions and categories can be assigned a policy which dictates how **mergerfs** behaves. Any policy can be assigned to a function or category though some may not be very useful in practice. For instance: **rand** (random) may be useful for file creation (create) but could lead to very odd behavior if used for `chmod` (though only if there were more than one copy of the file).
Policies, when called to create, will ignore drives which are readonly. This allows for readonly and read/write drives to be mixed together. Note that the drive must be explicitly mounted with the **ro** mount option for this to work.
When using policies which are based on a device's available space the base path provided is used. Not the full path to the file in question. Meaning that sub mounts won't be considered in the space calculations. The reason is that it doesn't really work for non-path preserving policies and can lead to non-obvious behaviors.
Due to FUSE limitations **ioctl** behaves differently if its acting on a directory. It'll use the **getattr** policy to find and open the directory before issuing the **ioctl**. In other cases where something may be searched (to confirm a directory exists across all source mounts) **getattr** will also be used.
#### Path Preservation
Policies, as described below, are of two core types. `path preserving` and `non-path preserving`.
All policies which start with `ep` (**epff**, **eplfs**, **eplus**, **epmfs**, **eprand**) are `path preserving`. `ep` stands for `existing path`.
A path preserving policy will only consider drives where the relative path being accessed already exists.
When using non-path preserving policies paths will be cloned to target drives as necessary.
#### Policy descriptions
All **create** policies will filter out branches which are mounted **read only** or tagged as **read only** or **no create**. All **action** policies will filter out branches which are mounted or tagged as **read only**.
If all branches are filtered an error will be returned. Typically EROFS or ENOSPC.
| all | Search category: acts like **ff**. Action category: apply to all found. Create category: for **mkdir**, **mknod**, and **symlink** it will apply to all branches. **create** works like **ff**. It will exclude branches with free space less than **minfreespace**. |
| epall (existing path, all) | Search category: acts like **epff**. Action category: apply to all found. Create category: for **mkdir**, **mknod**, and **symlink** it will apply to all existing paths found. **create** works like **epff**. Excludes branches with free space less than **minfreespace**. |
| epff (existing path, first found) | Given the order of the drives, as defined at mount time or configured at runtime, act on the first one found where the relative path already exists. For **create** category functions it will exclude branches with free space less than **minfreespace**. |
| eplfs (existing path, least free space) | Of all the drives on which the relative path exists choose the drive with the least free space. For **create** category functions it will exclude those with free space less than **minfreespace**. |
| eplus (existing path, least used space) | Of all the drives on which the relative path exists choose the drive with the least used space. For **create** category functions it will exclude those with free space less than **minfreespace**. |
| epmfs (existing path, most free space) | Of all the drives on which the relative path exists choose the drive with the most free space. For **create** category functions it will exclude those with free space less than **minfreespace**. |
| eprand (existing path, random) | Calls **epall** and then randomizes. Otherwise behaves the same as **epall**. |
| erofs | Exclusively return **-1** with **errno** set to **EROFS** (Read-only filesystem). |
| ff (first found) | Given the order of the drives, as defined at mount time or configured at runtime, act on the first one found. For **create** category functions it will exclude those with free space less than **minfreespace**. |
| lfs (least free space) | Pick the drive with the least available free space. For **create** category functions it will exclude those with free space less than **minfreespace**. |
| lus (least used space) | Pick the drive with the least used space. For **create** category functions it will exclude those with free space less than **minfreespace**. |
| mfs (most free space) | Pick the drive with the most available free space. |
| newest | Pick the file / directory with the largest mtime. For **create** category functions it will exclude those with free space less than **minfreespace**. |
| rand (random) | Calls **all** and then randomizes. |
#### Defaults ####
| Category | Policy |
|----------|--------|
| action | epall |
| create | epmfs |
| search | ff |
#### rename & link ####
**NOTE:** If you're receiving errors from software when files are moved / renamed then you should consider changing the create policy to one which is **not** path preserving, enabling `ignorepponrename`, or contacting the author of the offending software and requesting that `EXDEV` be properly handled.
[rename](http://man7.org/linux/man-pages/man2/rename.2.html) is a tricky function in a merged system. Under normal situations rename only works within a single filesystem or device. If a rename can't be done atomically due to the source and destination paths existing on different mount points it will return **-1** with **errno = EXDEV** (cross device).
Originally mergerfs would return EXDEV whenever a rename was requested which was cross directory in any way. This made the code simple and was technically complient with POSIX requirements. However, many applications fail to handle EXDEV at all and treat it as a normal error or otherwise handle it poorly. Such apps include: gvfsd-fuse v1.20.3 and prior, Finder / CIFS/SMB client in Apple OSX 10.9+, NZBGet, Samba's recycling bin feature.
As a result a compromise was made in order to get most software to work while still obeying mergerfs' policies. Below is the rather complicated logic.
* If using a **create** policy which tries to preserve directory paths (epff,eplfs,eplus,epmfs)
* Using the **rename** policy get the list of files to rename
* For each file attempt rename:
* If failure with ENOENT run **create** policy
* If create policy returns the same drive as currently evaluating then clone the path
* Re-attempt rename
* If **any** of the renames succeed the higher level rename is considered a success
* If **no** renames succeed the first error encountered will be returned
* On success:
* Remove the target from all drives with no source file
* Remove the source from all drives which failed to rename
* If using a **create** policy which does **not** try to preserve directory paths
* Using the **rename** policy get the list of files to rename
* Using the **getattr** policy get the target path
* For each file attempt rename:
* If the source drive != target drive:
* Clone target path from target drive to source drive
* Rename
* If **any** of the renames succeed the higher level rename is considered a success
* If **no** renames succeed the first error encountered will be returned
* On success:
* Remove the target from all drives with no source file
* Remove the source from all drives which failed to rename
The the removals are subject to normal entitlement checks.
The above behavior will help minimize the likelihood of EXDEV being returned but it will still be possible.
**link** uses the same basic strategy.
#### readdir ####
[readdir](http://linux.die.net/man/3/readdir) is different from all other filesystem functions. While it could have it's own set of policies to tweak its behavior at this time it provides a simple union of files and directories found. Remember that any action or information queried about these files and directories come from the respective function. For instance: an **ls** is a **readdir** and for each file/directory returned **getattr** is called. Meaning the policy of **getattr** is responsible for choosing the file/directory which is the source of the metadata you see in an **ls**.
#### statvfs ####
[statvfs](http://linux.die.net/man/2/statvfs) normalizes the source drives based on the fragment size and sums the number of adjusted blocks and inodes. This means you will see the combined space of all sources. Total, used, and free. The sources however are dedupped based on the drive so multiple sources on the same drive will not result in double counting it's space. Filesystems mounted further down the tree of the branch will not be included.
# BUILDING
**NOTE:** Prebuilt packages can be found at: https://github.com/trapexit/mergerfs/releases
First get the code from [github](http://github.com/trapexit/mergerfs).
Have git, g++, make, python, automake, libtool installed.
```
$ cd mergerfs
$ make
$ sudo make install
```
#### Generically with system libfuse
**NOTE:** Configurable threading and thus `-o threads=num` option will be unavailable when built with system libfuse.
Have git, g++, make, python, pkg-config installed.
Also, install libfuse >= 2.9.7 (but not libfuse-3.x) and matching libfuse-dev (or libfuse-devel).
```
$ cd mergerfs
$ make INTERNAL_FUSE=0
$ sudo make INTERNAL_FUSE=0 install
```
# RUNTIME
#### .mergerfs pseudo file ####
```
<mountpoint>/.mergerfs
```
There is a pseudo file available at the mount point which allows for the runtime modification of certain **mergerfs** options. The file will not show up in **readdir** but can be **stat**'ed and manipulated via [{list,get,set}xattrs](http://linux.die.net/man/2/listxattr) calls.
Any changes made at runtime are **not** persisted. If you wish for values to persist they must be included as options wherever you configure the mounting of mergerfs (/etc/fstab).
##### Keys #####
Use `xattr -l /mount/point/.mergerfs` to see all supported keys. Some are informational and therefore readonly.
###### user.mergerfs.branches ######
**NOTE:** formerly `user.mergerfs.srcmounts` but said key is still supported.
Used to query or modify the list of source mounts. When modifying there are several shortcuts to easy manipulation of the list.
While they won't show up when using [listxattr](http://linux.die.net/man/2/listxattr) **mergerfs** offers a number of special xattrs to query information about the files served. To access the values you will need to issue a [getxattr](http://linux.die.net/man/2/getxattr) for one of the following:
* **user.mergerfs.basepath:** the base mount point for the file given the current getattr policy
* **user.mergerfs.relpath:** the relative path of the file from the perspective of the mount point
* **user.mergerfs.fullpath:** the full path of the original file given the getattr policy
* **user.mergerfs.allpaths:** a NUL ('\0') separated list of full paths to all files found
```
[trapexit:/mnt/mergerfs] $ ls
A B C
[trapexit:/mnt/mergerfs] $ xattr -p user.mergerfs.fullpath A
/mnt/a/full/path/to/A
[trapexit:/mnt/mergerfs] $ xattr -p user.mergerfs.basepath A
/mnt/a
[trapexit:/mnt/mergerfs] $ xattr -p user.mergerfs.relpath A
/full/path/to/A
[trapexit:/mnt/mergerfs] $ xattr -p user.mergerfs.allpaths A | tr '\0' '\n'
/mnt/a/full/path/to/A
/mnt/b/full/path/to/A
```
# TOOLING
* https://github.com/trapexit/mergerfs-tools
* mergerfs.ctl: A tool to make it easier to query and configure mergerfs at runtime
* mergerfs.fsck: Provides permissions and ownership auditing and the ability to fix them
* mergerfs.dedup: Will help identify and optionally remove duplicate files
* mergerfs.dup: Ensure there are at least N copies of a file across the pool
* mergerfs.balance: Rebalance files across drives by moving them from the most filled to the least filled
* mergerfs.mktrash: Creates FreeDesktop.org Trash specification compatible directories on a mergerfs mount
* https://github.com/trapexit/scorch
* scorch: A tool to help discover silent corruption of files and keep track of files
* https://github.com/trapexit/bbf
* bbf (bad block finder): a tool to scan for and 'fix' hard drive bad blocks and find the files using those blocks
# CACHING
MergerFS does not natively support any sort of caching. Most users have no use for such a feature and it would greatly complicate the code. However, there are a few situations where a cache drive could help with a typical mergerfs setup.
1. Fast network, slow drives, many readers: You've a 10+Gbps network with many readers and your regular drives can't keep up.
2. Fast network, slow drives, small'ish bursty writes: You have a 10+Gbps network and wish to transfer amounts of data less than your cache drive but wish to do so quickly.
The below will mostly address usecase #2. It will also work for #1 assuming the data is regularly accessed and was placed into the system via this method. Otherwise a similar script may need to be written to populate the cache from the backing pool.
1. Create 2 mergerfs pools. One which includes just the backing drives and one which has both the cache drives (SSD,NVME,etc.) and backing drives.
2. The 'cache' pool should have the cache drives listed first.
3. The best policies to use for the 'cache' pool would probably be `ff`, `epff`, `lfs`, or `eplfs`. The latter two under the assumption that the cache drive(s) are far smaller than the backing drives. If using path preserving policies remember that you'll need to manually create the core directories of those paths you wish to be cached. (Be sure the permissions are in sync. Use `mergerfs.fsck` to check / correct them.)
4. Enable `moveonenospc` and set `minfreespace` appropriately.
5. Set your programs to use the cache pool.
6. Save one of the below scripts.
7. Use `crontab` (as root) to schedule the command at whatever frequency is appropriate for your workflow.
### Time based expiring
Move files from cache to backing pool based only on the last time the file was accessed.
* The recommended base options are **defaults,allow_other,direct_io,use_ino**. (**use_ino** will only work when used with mergerfs 2.18.0 and above.)
* Run mergerfs as `root` unless you're merging paths which are owned by the same user otherwise strange permission issues may arise.
* https://github.com/trapexit/backup-and-recovery-howtos : A set of guides / howtos on creating a data storage system, backing it up, maintaining it, and recovering from failure.
* If you don't see some directories and files you expect in a merged point or policies seem to skip drives be sure the user has permission to all the underlying directories. Use `mergerfs.fsck` to audit the drive for out of sync permissions.
* Do **not** use `direct_io` if you expect applications (such as rtorrent) to [mmap](http://linux.die.net/man/2/mmap) files. It is not currently supported in FUSE w/ `direct_io` enabled. Enabling `dropcacheonclose` is recommended when `direct_io` is disabled.
* Since POSIX gives you only error or success on calls its difficult to determine the proper behavior when applying the behavior to multiple targets. **mergerfs** will return an error only if all attempts of an action fail. Any success will lead to a success returned. This means however that some odd situations may arise.
* [Kodi](http://kodi.tv), [Plex](http://plex.tv), [Subsonic](http://subsonic.org), etc. can use directory [mtime](http://linux.die.net/man/2/stat) to more efficiently determine whether to scan for new content rather than simply performing a full scan. If using the default **getattr** policy of **ff** its possible those programs will miss an update on account of it returning the first directory found's **stat** info and its a later directory on another mount which had the **mtime** recently updated. To fix this you will want to set **func.getattr=newest**. Remember though that this is just **stat**. If the file is later **open**'ed or **unlink**'ed and the policy is different for those then a completely different file or directory could be acted on.
* Some policies mixed with some functions may result in strange behaviors. Not that some of these behaviors and race conditions couldn't happen outside **mergerfs** but that they are far more likely to occur on account of the attempt to merge together multiple sources of data which could be out of sync due to the different policies.
* For consistency its generally best to set **category** wide policies rather than individual **func**'s. This will help limit the confusion of tools such as [rsync](http://linux.die.net/man/1/rsync). However, the flexibility is there if needed.
# KNOWN ISSUES / BUGS
#### directory mtime is not being updated
Remember that the default policy for `getattr` is `ff`. The information for the first directory found will be returned. If it wasn't the directory which had been updated then it will appear outdated.
The reason this is the default is because any other policy would be far more expensive and for many applications it is unnecessary. To always return the directory with the most recent mtime or a faked value based on all found would require a scan of all drives. That alone is far more expensive than `ff` but would also possibly spin up sleeping drives.
If you always want the directory information from the one with the most recent mtime then use the `newest` policy for `getattr`.
#### cached memory appears greater than it should be
Use the `direct_io` option as described above. Due to what mergerfs is doing there ends up being two caches of a file under normal usage. One from the underlying filesystem and one from mergerfs. Enabling `direct_io` removes the mergerfs cache. This saves on memory but means the kernel needs to communicate with mergerfs more often and can therefore result in slower speeds.
Since enabling `direct_io` disables `mmap` this is not an ideal situation however write speeds should be increased.
If `direct_io` is disabled it is probably a good idea to enable `dropcacheonclose` to minimize double caching.
#### NFS clients don't work
Some NFS clients appear to fail when a mergerfs mount is exported. Kodi in particular seems to have issues.
Try enabling the `use_ino` option. Some have reported that it fixes the issue.
#### rtorrent fails with ENODEV (No such device)
Be sure to turn off `direct_io`. rtorrent and some other applications use [mmap](http://linux.die.net/man/2/mmap) to read and write to files and offer no failback to traditional methods. FUSE does not currently support mmap while using `direct_io`. There will be a performance penalty on writes with `direct_io` off as well as the problem of double caching but it's the only way to get such applications to work. If the performance loss is too high for other apps you can mount mergerfs twice. Once with `direct_io` enabled and one without it.
#### Plex doesn't work with mergerfs
It does. If you're trying to put Plex's config / metadata on mergerfs you have to leave `direct_io` off because Plex is using sqlite which apparently needs mmap. mmap doesn't work with `direct_io`.
If the issue is that scanning doesn't seem to pick up media then be sure to set `func.getattr=newest` as mentioned above.
#### mmap performance is really bad
There [is a bug](https://lkml.org/lkml/2016/3/16/260) in caching which affects overall performance of mmap through FUSE in Linux 4.x kernels. It is fixed in [4.4.10 and 4.5.4](https://lkml.org/lkml/2016/5/11/59).
#### When a program tries to move or rename a file it fails
Please read the section above regarding [rename & link](#rename--link).
The problem is that many applications do not properly handle `EXDEV` errors which `rename` and `link` may return even though they are perfectly valid situations which do not indicate actual drive or OS errors. The error will only be returned by mergerfs if using a path preserving policy as described in the policy section above. If you do not care about path preservation simply change the mergerfs policy to the non-path preserving version. For example: `-o category.create=mfs`
Ideally the offending software would be fixed and it is recommended that if you run into this problem you contact the software's author and request proper handling of `EXDEV` errors.
#### Samba: Moving files / directories fails
Workaround: Copy the file/directory and then remove the original rather than move.
This isn't an issue with Samba but some SMB clients. GVFS-fuse v1.20.3 and prior (found in Ubuntu 14.04 among others) failed to handle certain error codes correctly. Particularly **STATUS_NOT_SAME_DEVICE** which comes from the **EXDEV** which is returned by **rename** when the call is crossing mount points. When a program gets an **EXDEV** it needs to explicitly take an alternate action to accomplish it's goal. In the case of **mv** or similar it tries **rename** and on **EXDEV** falls back to a manual copying of data between the two locations and unlinking the source. In these older versions of GVFS-fuse if it received **EXDEV** it would translate that into **EIO**. This would cause **mv** or most any application attempting to move files around on that SMB share to fail with a IO error.
[GVFS-fuse v1.22.0](https://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=734568) and above fixed this issue but a large number of systems use the older release. On Ubuntu the version can be checked by issuing `apt-cache showpkg gvfs-fuse`. Most distros released in 2015 seem to have the updated release and will work fine but older systems may not. Upgrading gvfs-fuse or the distro in general will address the problem.
In Apple's MacOSX 10.9 they replaced Samba (client and server) with their own product. It appears their new client does not handle **EXDEV** either and responds similar to older release of gvfs on Linux.
#### Trashing files occasionally fails
This is the same issue as with Samba. `rename` returns `EXDEV` (in our case that will really only happen with path preserving policies like `epmfs`) and the software doesn't handle the situtation well. This is unfortunately a common failure of software which moves files around. The standard indicates that an implementation `MAY` choose to support non-user home directory trashing of files (which is a `MUST`). The implementation `MAY` also support "top directory trashes" which many probably do.
To create a `$topdir/.Trash` directory as defined in the standard use the [mergerfs-tools](https://github.com/trapexit/mergerfs-tools) tool `mergerfs.mktrash`.
#### tar: Directory renamed before its status could be extracted
Make sure to use the `use_ino` option.
#### Supplemental user groups
Due to the overhead of [getgroups/setgroups](http://linux.die.net/man/2/setgroups) mergerfs utilizes a cache. This cache is opportunistic and per thread. Each thread will query the supplemental groups for a user when that particular thread needs to change credentials and will keep that data for the lifetime of the thread. This means that if a user is added to a group it may not be picked up without the restart of mergerfs. However, since the high level FUSE API's (at least the standard version) thread pool dynamically grows and shrinks it's possible that over time a thread will be killed and later a new thread with no cache will start and query the new data.
The gid cache uses fixed storage to simplify the design and be compatible with older systems which may not have C++11 compilers. There is enough storage for 256 users' supplemental groups. Each user is allowed upto 32 supplemental groups. Linux >= 2.6.3 allows upto 65535 groups per user but most other *nixs allow far less. NFS allowing only 16. The system does handle overflow gracefully. If the user has more than 32 supplemental groups only the first 32 will be used. If more than 256 users are using the system when an uncached user is found it will evict an existing user's cache at random. So long as there aren't more than 256 active users this should be fine. If either value is too low for your needs you will have to modify `gidcache.hpp` to increase the values. Note that doing so will increase the memory needed by each thread.
#### mergerfs or libfuse crashing
**NOTE:** as of mergerfs 2.22.0 it includes the most recent version of libfuse (or requires libfuse-2.9.7) so any crash should be reported. For older releases continue reading...
If suddenly the mergerfs mount point disappears and `Transport endpoint is not connected` is returned when attempting to perform actions within the mount directory **and** the version of libfuse (use `mergerfs -v` to find the version) is older than `2.9.4` its likely due to a bug in libfuse. Affected versions of libfuse can be found in Debian Wheezy, Ubuntu Precise and others.
In order to fix this please install newer versions of libfuse. If using a Debian based distro (Debian,Ubuntu,Mint) you can likely just install newer versions of [libfuse](https://packages.debian.org/unstable/libfuse2) and [fuse](https://packages.debian.org/unstable/fuse) from the repo of a newer release.
#### mergerfs appears to be crashing or exiting
There seems to be an issue with Linux version `4.9.0` and above in which an invalid message appears to be transmitted to libfuse (used by mergerfs) causing it to exit. No messages will be printed in any logs as its not a proper crash. Debugging of the issue is still ongoing and can be followed via the [fuse-devel thread](https://sourceforge.net/p/fuse/mailman/message/35662577).
#### mergerfs under heavy load and memory preasure leads to kernel panic
https://lkml.org/lkml/2016/9/14/527
```
[25192.515454] kernel BUG at /build/linux-a2WvEb/linux-4.4.0/mm/workingset.c:346!
There is a bug in the kernel. A work around appears to be turning off `splice`. Add `no_splice_write,no_splice_move,no_splice_read` to mergerfs' options. Should be placed after `defaults` if it is used since it will turn them on. This however is not guaranteed to work.
#### rm: fts_read failed: No such file or directory
Not *really* a bug. The FUSE library will move files when asked to delete them as a way to deal with certain edge cases and then later delete that file when its clear the file is no longer needed. This however can lead to two issues. One is that these hidden files are noticed by `rm -rf` or `find` when scanning directories and they may try to remove them and they might have disappeared already. There is nothing *wrong* about this happening but it can be annoying. The second issue is that a directory might not be able to removed on account of the hidden file being still there.
Using the **hard_remove** option will make it so these temporary files are not used and files are deleted immedately. That has a side effect however. Files which are unlinked and then they are still used (in certain forms) will result in an error.
# FAQ
#### How well does mergerfs scale? Is it "production ready?"
Users have reported running mergerfs on everything from a Raspberry Pi to dual socket Xeon systems with >20 cores. I'm aware of at least a few companies which use mergerfs in production. [Open Media Vault](https://www.openmediavault.org) includes mergerfs is it's sole solution for pooling drives.
#### Can mergerfs be used with drives which already have data / are in use?
Yes. MergerFS is a proxy and does **NOT** interfere with the normal form or function of the drives / mounts / paths it manages.
MergerFS is **not** a traditional filesystem. MergerFS is **not** RAID. It does **not** manipulate the data that passes through it. It does **not** shard data across drives. It merely shards some **behavior** and aggregates others.
#### Can mergerfs be removed without affecting the data?
See the previous question's answer.
#### Do hard links work?
Yes. You need to use `use_ino` to support proper reporting of inodes. Read the section "rename & link" for caveats.
#### Does mergerfs support CoW / copy-on-write?
Not in the sense of a filesystem like BTRFS or ZFS nor in the overlayfs or aufs sense. It does offer a [cow-shell](http://manpages.ubuntu.com/manpages/bionic/man1/cow-shell.1.html) like hardlink breaking (copy to temp file then rename over original) which can be useful when wanting to save space by hardlinking duplicate files but wish to treat each name as if it were a unique and separate file.
#### Why can't I see my files / directories?
It's almost always a permissions issue. Unlike mhddfs, which runs as root and attempts to access content as such, mergerfs always changes it's credentials to that of the caller. This means that if the user does not have access to a file or directory than neither will mergerfs. However, because mergerfs is creating a union of paths it may be able to read some files and directories on one drive but not another resulting in an incomplete set.
Whenever you run into a split permission issue (seeing some but not all files) try using [mergerfs.fsck](https://github.com/trapexit/mergerfs-tools) tool to check for and fix the mismatch. If you aren't seeing anything at all be sure that the basic permissions are correct. The user and group values are correct and that directories have their executable bit set. A common mistake by users new to Linux is to `chmod -R 644` when they should have `chmod -R u=rwX,go=rX`.
If using a network filesystem such as NFS, SMB, CIFS (Samba) be sure to pay close attention to anything regarding permissioning and users. Root squashing and user translation for instance has bitten a few mergerfs users. Some of these also affect the use of mergerfs from container platforms such as Docker.
#### Why is only one drive being used?
Are you using a path preserving policy? The default policy for file creation is `epmfs`. That means only the drives with the path preexisting will be considered when creating a file. If you don't care about where files and directories are created you likely shouldn't be using a path preserving policy and instead something like `mfs`.
This can be especially apparent when filling an empty pool from an external source. If you do want path preservation you'll need to perform the manual act of creating paths on the drives you want the data to land on before transfering your data.
#### Why was libfuse embedded into mergerfs?
A significant number of users use mergerfs on distros with very old versions of libfuse which have serious bugs. Requiring updated versions of libfuse on those distros isn't pratical (no package offered, user inexperience, etc.). The only practical way to provide a stable runtime on those systems was to "vendor" the library into the project.
#### Why use mergerfs over mhddfs?
mhddfs is no longer maintained and has some known stability and security issues (see below). MergerFS provides a superset of mhddfs' features and should offer the same or maybe better performance.
Below is an example of mhddfs and mergerfs setup to work similarly.
aufs is mostly abandoned and no longer available in many distros.
While aufs can offer better peak performance mergerfs provides more configurability and is generally easier to use. mergerfs however does not offer the overlay / copy-on-write (CoW) features which aufs and overlayfs have.
#### Why use mergerfs over unionfs?
UnionFS is more like aufs then mergerfs in that it offers overlay / CoW features. If you're just looking to create a union of drives and want flexibility in file/directory placement then mergerfs offers that whereas unionfs is more for overlaying RW filesystems over RO ones.
#### Why use mergerfs over LVM/ZFS/BTRFS/RAID0 drive concatenation / striping?
With simple JBOD / drive concatenation / stripping / RAID0 a single drive failure will result in full pool failure. mergerfs performs a similar behavior without the possibility of catastrophic failure and the difficulties in recovery. Drives may fail however all other data will continue to be accessable.
When combined with something like [SnapRaid](http://www.snapraid.it) and/or an offsite backup solution you can have the flexibilty of JBOD without the single point of failure.
#### Why use mergerfs over ZFS?
MergerFS is not intended to be a replacement for ZFS. MergerFS is intended to provide flexible pooling of arbitrary drives (local or remote), of arbitrary sizes, and arbitrary filesystems. For `write once, read many` usecases such as bulk media storage. Where data integrity and backup is managed in other ways. In that situation ZFS can introduce major maintance and cost burdens as described [here](http://louwrentius.com/the-hidden-cost-of-using-zfs-for-your-home-nas.html).
#### Can drives be written to directly? Outside of mergerfs while pooled?
Yes. It will be represented immediately in the pool as the policies perscribe.
#### Why do I get an "out of space" error even though the system says there's lots of space left?
First make sure you've read the sections above about policies, path preserving, and the **moveonenospc** option.
Remember that mergerfs is simply presenting a logical merging of the contents of the pooled drives. The reported free space is the aggregate space available **not** the contiguous space available. MergerFS does not split files across drives. If the writing of a file fills an underlying drive and **moveonenospc** is disabled it will return an ENOSPC (No space left on device) error.
If **moveonenospc** is enabled but there exists no drives with enough space for the file and the data to be written (or the drive happened to fill up as the file was being moved) it will error indicating there isn't enough space.
It is also possible that the filesystem selected has run out of inodes. Use `df -i` to list the total and available inodes per filesystem. In the future it might be worth considering the number of inodes available when making placement decisions in order to minimize this situation.
#### Can mergerfs mounts be exported over NFS?
Yes. Some clients (Kodi) have issues in which the contents of the NFS mount will not be presented but users have found that enabling the `use_ino` option often fixes that problem.
#### Can mergerfs mounts be exported over Samba / SMB?
Yes. While some users have reported problems it appears to always be related to how Samba is setup in relation to permissions.
While `ino_t` is 64 bits only a few filesystems use more than 32. Similarly, while `dev_t` is also 64 bits it was traditionally 16 bits. Bitwise or'ing them together should work most of the time. While totally unique inodes are preferred the overhead which would be needed does not seem to outweighted by the benefits.
While atypical, yes, inodes can be reused and not refer to the same file. The internal id used to reference a file in FUSE is different from the inode value presented. The former is the `nodeid` and is actually a tuple of (nodeid,generation). That tuple is not user facing. The inode is merely metadata passed through the kernel and found using the `stat` family of calls or `readdir`.
From FUSE docs regarding `use_ino`:
```
Honor the st_ino field in the functions getattr() and
fill_dir(). This value is used to fill in the st_ino field
in the stat(2), lstat(2), fstat(2) functions and the d_ino
field in the readdir(2) function. The filesystem does not
have to guarantee uniqueness, however some applications
rely on this value being unique for the whole filesystem.
Note that this does *not* affect the inode that libfuse
and the kernel use internally (also called the "nodeid").
```
#### I notice massive slowdowns of writes over NFS
Due to how NFS works and interacts with FUSE when not using `direct_io` its possible that a getxattr for `security.capability` will be issued prior to any write. This will usually result in a massive slowdown for writes. Using `direct_io` will keep this from happening (and generally good to enable unless you need the features it disables) but the `security_capability` option can also help by short circuiting the call and returning `ENOATTR`.
You could also set `xattr` to `noattr` or `notsup` to short circuit or stop all xattr requests.
#### What are these .fuse_hidden files?
When not using `hard_remove` libfuse will create .fuse_hiddenXXXXXXXX files when an opened file is unlinked. This is to simplify "use after unlink" usecases. There is a possibility these files end up being picked up by software scanning directories and not ignoring hidden files. This is rarely a problem but a solution is in the works.
The files are cleaned up once the file is finally closed. Only if mergerfs crashes or is killed would they be left around.
#### It's mentioned that there are some security issues with mhddfs. What are they? How does mergerfs address them?
[mhddfs](https://github.com/trapexit/mhddfs) manages running as **root** by calling [getuid()](https://github.com/trapexit/mhddfs/blob/cae96e6251dd91e2bdc24800b4a18a74044f6672/src/main.c#L319) and if it returns **0** then it will [chown](http://linux.die.net/man/1/chown) the file. Not only is that a race condition but it doesn't handle many other situations. Rather than attempting to simulate POSIX ACL behavior the proper way to manage this is to use [seteuid](http://linux.die.net/man/2/seteuid) and [setegid](http://linux.die.net/man/2/setegid), in effect becoming the user making the original call, and perform the action as them. This is what mergerfs does.
In Linux setreuid syscalls apply only to the thread. GLIBC hides this away by using realtime signals to inform all threads to change credentials. Taking after **Samba**, mergerfs uses **syscall(SYS_setreuid,...)** to set the callers credentials for that thread only. Jumping back to **root** as necessary should escalated privileges be needed (for instance: to clone paths between drives).
For non-Linux systems mergerfs uses a read-write lock and changes credentials only when necessary. If multiple threads are to be user X then only the first one will need to change the processes credentials. So long as the other threads need to be user X they will take a readlock allowing multiple threads to share the credentials. Once a request comes in to run as user Y that thread will attempt a write lock and change to Y's credentials when it can. If the ability to give writers priority is supported then that flag will be used so threads trying to change credentials don't starve. This isn't the best solution but should work reasonably well assuming there are few users.
* try adding (or removing) `kernel_cache` (don't use the underlying filesystems directly if enabling `kernel_cache`)
* try adding (or removing) `splice_move`, `splice_read`, and `splice_write` (all three included in `defaults`)
* try changing the number of worker threads
* try disabling `security_capability` or `xattr`
* test theoretical performance using `nullrw` or mounting a ram disk
* use `symlinkify` if your data is largely static and you need native speed reads
* use lvm and lvm cache to place a SSD in front of your HDDs (howto coming)
# SUPPORT
Filesystems are very complex and difficult to debug. mergerfs, while being just a proxy of sorts, is also very difficult to debug given the large number of possible settings it can have itself and the massive number of environments it can run in. When reporting on a suspected issue **please, please** include as much of the below information as possible otherwise it will be difficult or impossible to diagnose. Also please make sure to read all of the above documentation as it includes nearly every known system or user issue previously encountered.
#### Information to include in bug reports
* Version of mergerfs: `mergerfs -V`
* mergerfs settings: from `/etc/fstab` or command line execution
* Version of Linux: `uname -a`
* Versions of any additional software being used
* List of drives, their filesystems, and sizes (before and after issue): `df -h`
* A `strace` of the app having problems:
*`strace -f -o /tmp/app.strace.txt <cmd>`
* A `strace` of mergerfs while the program is trying to do whatever it's failing to do:
This software is free to use and released under a very liberal license. That said if you like this software and would like to support its development donations are welcome.
.THFUSERMOUNT12011\-10\-232.8.6"Filesystem in Userspace (FUSE)"
.SHNAME
\fBfusermount\fR\- mount and unmount FUSE filesystems
.SHSYNOPSIS
\fBfusermount\fR [\fIOPTIONS\fR] \fIMOUNTPOINT\fR
.SHDESCRIPTION
Filesystem in Userspace (FUSE) is a simple interface for userspace programs to export a virtual filesystem to the Linux kernel. It also aims to provide a secure method for non privileged users to create and mount their own filesystem implementations.
.PP
\fBfusermount\fR is a program to mount and unmount FUSE filesystems.
.SHOPTIONS
.IP"\-h"4
print help.
.IP"\-V"4
print version.
.IP"-o \fIOPTION\fR[,\fIOPTION\fR...]"4
mount options.
.IP"-u"4
unmount.
.IP"-q"4
quiet.
.IP"-z"4
lazy unmount.
.SHSEEALSO
\fImount\fR(8),
\fImount.fuse\fR(8),
\fIulockmgr_server\fR(1).
.SHHOMEPAGE
More information about fusermount and the FUSE project can be found at <\fIhttp://fuse.sourceforge.net/\fR>.
.SHAUTHOR
FUSE was written by Miklos Szeredi <\fImiklos@szeredi.hu\fR>.
.PP
This manual page was written by Daniel Baumann <\fIdaniel.baumann@progress\-technologies.net\fR>.
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