User:Grahamperrin

Graham Perrin

Mac user since 1992; administrator of Apple server hardware and software.

I provide IT support to a broad range of users in research and higher education at multiple locations in Brighton, UK. One day I might give it all up.

ZFS-oriented interests

Vague awareness was transformed to interest by 2006 articles such as Time Machine and the future of the file system | Ars Technica.

After Apple's ZFS project closed, I remained aware of MacZFS. Whilst MacZFS software became stable, it lacked the feature set and ease of use that I require.

For Apple:

• I test pre-release builds of OS X and other software titles.

For Ten's Complement:

• in August 2011 I began beta testing Z-410 Storage
• I continued beta testing after the March 2012 release of ZEVO Silver Edition.

I use GreenBytes ZEVO Community Edition 1.1.1.

For the MacZFS project:

• I occasionally alpha tested OpenZFS ZFS-OSX
  • usually on Mavericks, OS X 10.9, in an Oracle VirtualBoxVM.

In September 2013 I experimented with FreeNAS on a Dell Inspiron 545.

Contact

Ask Different Chat

• leave a message @grahamperrin
• the reputation required to talk is easily gained.

Instant messaging:

• xmpp:grahamperrin@jabber.org

IRC:

• irc://chat.freenode.net/#macosx and other Apple Mac-related channels
• irc://chat.freenode.net/#openzfs

Questions about development of MacZFS:

• MacZFS-devel
• http://maczfs.org for general information
• irc://chat.freenode.net/#mac-zfs is no longer used by me.

Questions about ZEVO:

• http://zevo.getgreenbytes.com/forum/ is politely read-only
• beyond Community Edition, I don't expect what's known as ZEVO to be known as such forever so irc://chat.freenode.net/#zevo is no longer used by me.

E-mail:

• most incoming mail nestles in a bottomless pit of umpteen thousand items that will remain unread

… so please prefer Ask Different Chat, instant messaging or IRC.

OpenZFS wish list

Uppermost on my list:

Compatible approaches to encryption

The Core Storage approach is functional, and seems reliable, but it's terribly limited compared to ZFS …

• a 2012 post by me
• amongst the OpenZFS projects, I see a preference for compatibility with pool version 30.

Everyday use of ZFS

Apple Mac laptop with Mountain Lion, OS X 10.8.5.

Apple Core Storage to encrypt:

• 99 GB of the internal disk for the operating system, apps and so on – HFS Plus
• 616 GB of the disk for my ZFS home directory – the Core Storage logical volume is given to ZEVO.

Performance of the ZFS pool for my home directory is reduced by the presence of HFS Plus on the same disk.

sh-3.2$ diskutil list disk0
/dev/disk0
   #:                       TYPE NAME                    SIZE       IDENTIFIER
   0:      GUID_partition_scheme                        *750.2 GB   disk0
   1:                        EFI                         209.7 MB   disk0s1
   2:                  Apple_HFS swap                    32.0 GB    disk0s2
   3:                  Apple_HFS disk0s3                 536.9 MB   disk0s3
   4:                  Apple_HFS spare                   671.1 MB   disk0s4
   5:          Apple_CoreStorage                         99.5 GB    disk0s5
   6:                 Apple_Boot Boot OS X               650.0 MB   disk0s6
   7:          Apple_CoreStorage                         616.3 GB   disk0s7
   8:                 Apple_Boot Boot OS X               134.2 MB   disk0s8

sh-3.2$ sw_vers
ProductName:	Mac OS X
ProductVersion:	10.8.5
BuildVersion:	12F45
sh-3.2$ uname -mprsv
Darwin 12.5.0 Darwin Kernel Version 12.5.0: Sun Sep 29 13:33:47 PDT 2013; root:xnu-2050.48.12~1/RELEASE_X86_64 x86_64 i386

Hardware

2009 MacBookPro5,2

• 8 GB memory
• Seagate Momentus® XT ST750LX003-1AC154 solid state hybrid drive (sshd).

Sitecom USB 2.0 Dock

• CN-022
• Apple's System Information shows this as product ID 0x0022
• typically in the rearmost port of the MacBookPro5,2.

2x Seagate Backup+ Desk

• product ID 0xa0a4
• 3 GB
• typically used with the Sitecom.

The two Backup+ Desk drives on the Sitecom form a pool that's simply striped – no redundancy of data. But things are backed up.

Cerulian 10 port USB 2.0 top loading hub

• Maplin Electronics code N14JB
• typically in the rearmost port of the MacBookPro5,2.

StoreJet Transcend

• TS640GSJ25M2
• similar to the 25M2 range, but a different capacity
• product ID 0x2329
• typically used with the Cerulian hub.

Seagate GoFlex Desk

• product ID 0x50a5
• 2 GB
• spare, may be used for ZFS-oriented testing.

Commitment to open source

Maybe due to my presence as a user in the ZEVO support forum, people sometimes imagine that I'm more interested in closed source than open source – not so. I use whatever is simplest and most reliable for me … essentials include:

• Mac hardware
• Apple operating systems
• ZEVO Community Edition.

Beyond the essentials:

• open source Plone for content management
• I prefer open source VirtualBox to closed source VMWare Fusion

… and so on.

Without Z-410 and ZEVO I would not have made it here. I'm here for OpenZFS.