Ubuntu's Ubiquity Installer Begins Adding ZFS Encryption Support

[phoronix]

Phoronix: Ubuntu's Ubiquity Installer Begins Adding ZFS Encryption Support

On the desktop side for Ubuntu 20.10 one of the changes we have been eager to see is ZFS encryption support on new installations in an easy-to-use manner and extending their existing OpenZFS file-system support. That ZFS encryption support has begun to land...

http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=Ubiquity-Commits-ZFS-Encrypt

[Hans Bull]

That's what I've been waiting for.

[steve007]

Benchmarking ZFS against Ext is like benchmarking an ethanol powered drag racer against a family minivan. One gets you from a-b really, really fast, but might kill random bystanders when it explodes. The other gets your precious babies from a-b in comfort, and does everything possible to protect and preserve them. If you select a filesystem based on a benchmark you are an idiot.

[tiennou]

Can't wait to see those benchmarks, although not really optimistic, the performance seems to have been seriously hampered ever since the kernel stopped exposing the simd instructions.

[Chugworth]

Now if we could just get the ZFS option in the Ubuntu Server installation, we'll be in business.

Can't wait to see those benchmarks, although not really optimistic, the performance seems to have been seriously hampered ever since the kernel stopped exposing the simd instructions.

Is Ubuntu not fixing that in their kernels? I thought it was just a simple patch.

[tiennou]

Is Ubuntu not fixing that in their kernels? I thought it was just a simple patch.

For example, there was a noticeable improvement in 0.8.4 (https://github.com/openzfs/zfs/pull/9749) which i haven't tested yet.
Not saying also that Ubuntu is not doing its job, just a general remark that ZoL is lagging a bit now that they've been barred from using some native kernel features.

[Vorpal]

Can't wait to see those benchmarks, although not really optimistic, the performance seems to have been seriously hampered ever since the kernel stopped exposing the simd instructions.

My understanding is that this is no longer a problem since https://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?pa...Restoring-SIMD. Unless something has broken it again.

[starshipeleven]

Can't wait to see those benchmarks, although not really optimistic, the performance seems to have been seriously hampered ever since the kernel stopped exposing the simd instructions.

afaik they worked around that some time ago

[Alexmitter]

I still don't get why people want a filesystem in Linux that has no change to ever be mainlined as it is clearly not license compatible to the GPL.
Other question, why should anyone prefer ZFS over BTRFS?

Could please someone explain that?

[tiennou]

Could please someone explain that?

My personnal experience has been that ZFS and its tools are a very complete solution and work like a breeze. When I made the choice, that was around time btrfs had raid6 issues, so that was an easy pick, but haven't had any regrets since (and I'd happily change my mind the day BTRFS proves to be better).
From an Ubuntu/user perspective, you should see the way the snapshots have been integrated (you can rollback your data or your root simply at boot-time) : easy and powerful, amazing added value.
I hope that the Canonical folks had done their homework and chose whichever was best although the licensing could be better.