computing Computing is any goal-oriented activity requiring, benefiting from, or creating computing machinery. It includes the study and experimentation of algorithmic processes, and development of both hardware and software. Computing has scientific, ...

, a NetWare File System (NWFS) is a

file system In computing, file system or filesystem (often abbreviated to fs) is a method and data structure that the operating system uses to control how data is stored and retrieved. Without a file system, data placed in a storage medium would be one lar ...

based on a heavily modified version of

FAT In nutrition, biology, and chemistry, fat usually means any ester of fatty acids, or a mixture of such compounds, most commonly those that occur in living beings or in food. The term often refers specifically to triglycerides (triple es ...

. It was used in the

Novell NetWare NetWare is a discontinued computer network operating system developed by Novell, Inc. It initially used cooperative multitasking to run various services on a personal computer, using the IPX network protocol. The original NetWare product in ...

operating system An operating system (OS) is system software that manages computer hardware, software resources, and provides common daemon (computing), services for computer programs. Time-sharing operating systems scheduler (computing), schedule tasks for ef ...

. It is the default and only file system for all volumes in versions 2.x through 4.x, and the default and only file system for the SYS volume continuing through version 5.x. Novell developed two varieties of NWFS: # 16-bit NWFS 286, used in NetWare 2.x # 32-bit NWFS 386, used in NetWare 3.x through NetWare 6.x.

Novell Storage Services Novell Storage Services (NSS) is a file system used by the Novell NetWare operating system. Support for NSS was introduced in 2004 to SUSE Linux via low-level network NCPFS protocol. It has some unique features that make it especially useful for ...

(NSS, released in 1998), superseded the NWFS format. The NWFS on-disk format was never publicly documented by Novell. The published specifications for 32-bit NWFS are: * Maximum file size: 4 GB * Maximum volume size: 1 TB * Maximum files per volume: 2 million when using a single name space. * Maximum files per server: 16 million * Maximum directory entries: 16 million * Maximum volumes per server: 64 * Maximum volumes per partition: 8 * Maximum open files per server: 100,000 * Maximum directory tree depth: 100 levels * Characters used: ASCII double-byte * Maximum extended attributes: 512 * Maximum data streams: 10 * Support for different name spaces: Microsoft Windows Long names (a.k.a.

OS/2 OS/2 (Operating System/2) is a series of computer operating systems, initially created by Microsoft and IBM under the leadership of IBM software designer Ed Iacobucci. As a result of a feud between the two companies over how to position OS/2 ...

namespace),

Unix Unix (; trademarked as UNIX) is a family of multitasking, multiuser computer operating systems that derive from the original AT&T Unix, whose development started in 1969 at the Bell Labs research center by Ken Thompson, Dennis Ritchie, a ...

Apple Macintosh The Mac (known as Macintosh until 1999) is a family of personal computers designed and marketed by Apple Inc. Macs are known for their ease of use and minimalist designs, and are popular among students, creative professionals, and software ...

* Support for restoring deleted files (salvage) * Support for journaling (Novell ''Transaction Tracking System'' a.k.a. ''TTS'') * Support for block suballocation, starting in NetWare 4.x For larger files the file system utilized a performance feature named ''Turbo FAT''. Transparent file compression was also supported, although this had a significant impact on the performance of file serving. Every name space requires its own separate directory entry for each file. While the maximum number of directory entries is 16,000,000, two resident name spaces would reduce the usable maximum number of directory entries to 8,000,000, and three to 5,333,333. 16-bit NWFS could handle volumes of up to 256 MB. However, its only name-space support was a dedicated

API An application programming interface (API) is a way for two or more computer programs to communicate with each other. It is a type of software interface, offering a service to other pieces of software. A document or standard that describes how ...

to handle Macintosh clients.

External links

Using the Transaction Tracking System
{{DEFAULTSORT:Netware File System Compression file systems Disk file systems Network file systems Novell NetWare

See also

External links