Bcachefs Submitted For Review - Next-Gen CoW File-System Aims For Mainline

In development for over a half-decade already has been Bcachefs as a copy-on-write (CoW) file-system born originally out of the Linux kernel's block cache code. On Tuesday the Bcachefs patch series was sent out for review and hopeful inclusion into the kernel by lead developer Kent Overstreet.

Kent Overstreet has been relentlessly working on Bcachefs the past number of years to evolve it into a modern and competitive file-system. Yesterday he formally submitted the patch-set for review and inclusion. The Bcachefs patches are currently based upon the Linux 6.3 source tree.

The features of the file-system are cited as "too many to list", but also the known bugs are "too many to list." Bcachefs has declared its snapshot support stable, erasure coding is nearly stable, and over the past year has been a lot of scalability improvements.

The Bcachefs copy-on-write file-system also natively supports multiple devices, provides full checksumming of data and metadata, supports replication, erasure coding, caching. compression, encryption, snapshots, and is deemed scalable.

Those interested can see this set of 32 patches providing the current Bcachefs kernel driver. Already though many code comments were raised about stylistic issues, technical changes, and more. So there will still likely be further refinements to Bcachefs before its hopeful inclusion into the kernel. At least though it's looking like it is nearing the point of finally reaching mainline.