F2FS Gains Native SWAP File Support, Other Improvements

F2FS is already very fast compared to the long-standing Linux file-systems when benchmarking on solid-state drives while for Linux 5.3 this file-system is getting in even better shape.

F2FS remains a very interesting file-system and has seen particularly good adoption on newer Android devices while it continues to shine as well for laptop and desktop SSD storage. With Linux 5.3 there is finally native SWAP file support for F2FS that can make use of direct I/O for better swapping performance. F2FS is also getting the ability to pre-allocate physical blocks in a pinned file to avoid fragmentation in append-only workloads, more sanity checks, and a variety of bug fixes.

Those interested in more details on the latest round of feature work for F2FS can visit the kernel mailing list for all the details within its pull request for the 5.3 kernel.