EXT4 Case Insensitive Support Sent In For The Linux 5.2 Kernel

[phoronix]

Phoronix: EXT4 Case Insensitive Support Sent In For The Linux 5.2 Kernel

The EXT4 case-insensitive directories / file-name lookups were sent in yesterday for the mainline Linux 5.2 kernel...

http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=EXT4-Case-Insensitive-Sent

[uid313]

Really great for the /home/ directory. Especially for the Documents, Downloads, Pictures, Music and Videos directory inside the user's home directory.

[birdie]

This should have been implemented at the VFS level. I've no idea why this was hard coded for ext4. And how Linus Torvalds endorsed this - usually he rejects half-solutions.

[oiaohm]

This should have been implemented at the VFS level. I've no idea why this was hard coded for ext4. And how Linus Torvalds endorsed this - usually he rejects half-solutions.

The simple answer is that it cannot just be at the VFS layer. All the issues wine runs into implementing different userspace solutions gives you what you will hit implementing at the VFS layer.

https://wiki.winehq.org/Case_Insensitive_Filenames

"Using a case-insensitive FUSE filesystem" here is the same as implementing at the VFS level. Wine project has tried stacks of different things to solve this beast.

VFS has been modified to a point by this process so that case sensitivity can be detected though it but the case sensitive/instinctive has to be file system.

Performing case insensitive that will not require doing horrible cpu consuming tasks or hit impossible issues need to be a file system level. Think this so that you cannot end up with Test and tEST in a case insensitive directory. Think how do you decide what one to give to the application wine third party developers tried all kinds of things with fuse to attempt to solve this only to find out there is no correct solution.

Yes there might appear to be many different solutions but when you implement them you can see all bar 1 fall in a heap of fail. Wine and Samba have tried the lot.

Results of Samba/Wine Case Insensitive solutions
1) Userspace solution falls in a heap of I cannot solve this and performance killing fail.
2) Fuse base solutions fall into a heap of I cannot solve this and performance killing fail.
3) VFS base solutions would fall into a heap of I cannot solve this and performance killing fail.
4) File system level works ideal with some alterations to VFS so you can find out what directories are and are not case insensitive..

Really I would like to hear if you know of some solution that is not covered by what Samba/Wine have tried as I am fairly sure they tried everything.

Please note point 4 File system works Vfat driver that does like fat32 has been doing it for ages and not hitting I cannot solve this or performance killing.

[schmidtbag]

Aside from Wine programs, the only time I really see this being especially useful is Windows network shares.

As long as this feature isn't enabled by default, I don't see the harm in including it.

[lostdistance]

Other users meanwhile are not happy seeing EXT4 support this Windows-like case insensitivity concept.

JFS has supported case-insensitive filenames for years (mkfs.jfs -O), seemingly without comment.

[Nocifer]

This is going to be AWESOME for Wine and Samba shares, and also for gaming in general (e.g. modding).

This should have been implemented at the VFS level. I've no idea why this was hard coded for ext4. And how Linus Torvalds endorsed this - usually he rejects half-solutions.

As I understand it, the guys that do have a good idea about these things (e.g. Torvalds himself) have decided that for various reasons (some of which oiaohm already mentioned) this functionality will have to be split in two parts, one of which will have to be developed separately for each filesystem. Ext4, being the de facto main Linux filesystem, has received this support first, but by no means is it hard coded - the devs of the other filesystems can (and probably will) add support for this feature as well.

As long as this feature isn't enabled by default, I don't see the harm in including it.

Well, since it's per directory only I guess it can't ever be enabled by default. It's just a bit flag.

Other users meanwhile are not happy seeing EXT4 support this Windows-like case insensitivity concept.

Like other people have said in previous threads about this subject, it's absolutely lovely how some proponents of the "pro choice" Linux movement seem to absolutely despise when those choices aren't made by them. Is it opt-in? Yes. Does it hamper performance and/or security? Nope. So please, do us all a favor and be silent, guys. That said, I'm curious as to why exactly they're not happy about this support. Is it something more serious than "we don't want M$ crap polluting our sacred kernel"?

[andrei_me]

Being in linux for some time, I have more issues with Windows case insensitiveness than Linux case-sensitiveness

[tildearrow]

Being in linux for some time, I have more issues with Windows case insensitiveness than Linux case-sensitiveness

True. I really hope this is completely optional and disabled for new directories by default.

[starshipeleven]

True. I really hope this is completely optional and disabled for new directories by default.

They can't enable this by default without causing MASSIVE breakage everywhere. You people should really calm yo tits, there is no Winux in sight.

Who are these 3 people who think it'd be a good idea?!

-a webdeveloper that said he can't do basic operations with git commandline
-a guy that mentioned using Wine for Windows programs (that expect non-case-sensitive filesystems)
-a guy that mentioned Wine and Samba (again inter-op with windows technology that does not expect case-sensitive filesystems)