Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

The Design Of The Google File System

Posted by timothy on from the library-of-babel dept.

Freddles writes "This is an interesting paper (PDF) describing the design approach to Google's file system. The design had to take account of requirements for huge file sizes, a highly responsive infrastructure and an assumption that hardware components will always fail."

31 of 210 comments (clear)

  1. Thoughtful... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    It was thoughtful of the poster to link to google.com for those that have never heard of it.

    1. Re:Thoughtful... by Queuetue · · Score: 5, Funny

      Absolutely - I was about to go look google up on teoma and askjeeves...

    2. Re:Thoughtful... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

      Last week I had a co-worker ask how to spell it. He is MS cert'd for Win2k Pro. Don't mod this funny, it's sad.

    3. Re:Thoughtful... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

      Unfortunately, we can't mod it sad, you have to go to fark to do that.

    4. Re:Thoughtful... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

      That reminds me of all those personal web pages back in 1997 that had link sections, and they always had links to, say, Lycos. As if I couldn't find the search site myself!

    5. Re:Thoughtful... by Morosoph · · Score: 2, Funny

      In case of Slashdotting

      Take note: "Google is not affiliated with the authors of this page nor responsible for its content."

      --
      Wikileaks, no DNS
    6. Re:Thoughtful... by daeley · · Score: 3, Funny

      Last week I had a co-worker ask how to spell it

      I-T. Really now, how hard is that?

      --
      I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhauser gate.
  2. Story summary by slash-tard · · Score: 4, Funny

    Google uses MS access as a backend to store all of its cache files. It is redundant by having a batch file setup with the windows "at" command to "xcopy" the data to another backup server.

  3. Hmmm. by Pig+Hogger · · Score: 4, Funny

    I'd like to see a beow...
    Never mind.

  4. Re:In case you don't like PDF by redJag · · Score: 3, Funny

    In case you hate highlighting as I do:
    try this :)

    I wish I had enough RAM to use as a harddisk. Then I could...well no, I wouldn't do anything useful. It would be cool, in a geeky way.

  5. Everything's stolen nowdays. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny


    Why the google file system is nothing but a waffle iron with a phone attached.

  6. Is it open source? by The+Ancients · · Score: 4, Funny

    I need something for my p...err, book collection.

    --
    The Mothership
    1. Re:Is it open source? by daeley · · Score: 2, Funny

      book collection

      Ah, yes. You want a new-fangled "ShelFS" system.

      --
      I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhauser gate.
  7. Re:You mean FAT don't cut it no more? by Russ+Steffen · · Score: 2, Funny

    I think you mean "WEEEEEEE.EEE." Or possibly "WEEEEEE~1.EEE."

  8. Re:You mean FAT don't cut it no more? by Wumpus · · Score: 4, Funny

    Surely you mean "WEEEEE~1.EEE".

  9. Interactive demo by javaaddikt · · Score: 1, Funny

    Check out the interactive demo of how GFS works.

  10. Google FS? by Dark+Lord+Seth · · Score: 1, Funny

    What's next? GoogleOS? Google Electronics? Google Nuclear Power Plant? Google Search Engine? Oh wait...

    --
    Hate me!
    1. Re:Google FS? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

      Google-Linux :)

      installed with the new extgoogle filesystem...

      using xfreegoogle for frame buffering, browse the internet with mozgooglla, and do your work with googleoffice...

  11. Re:great. now, deal with the spam issue by winkydink · · Score: 4, Funny
    how many times have you searched for something on google, only to find that the search engine spammers have taken over almost every top 10 result?

    Ummm... not very many. Then again, I try not to search on "teen panties" very often. :)

    That reminds me of the winter I spent in Chicago. I needed some galoshes to protect my shoes and keep my feet dry. Back in New England, we called them "rubbers" (I am not making this up). Needless to say, a google search on "buy rubbers" did not yield the intended results.

    --

    "I'd rather be a lightning rod than a seismometer." -Ken Kesey

  12. Everyone still uses Latex in university. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

    Just for covering their penis, not reading papers.

  13. Re:real "Google"? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

    No, but we can mod you down.

  14. When will it be in the kernel? by caluml · · Score: 3, Funny
    I hope they're going to release it to us mere mortals. I mean, they're probably the only people that need millions of gigabyte+ files floating around thousands of machines, but it would be nice to see

    [ ] Google File System.

    in the kernel config.

    Must be 12pm - the updatedb script it running.

    --
    Get your own free personal location tracker
  15. And starting with Linux 2.7... by JessLeah · · Score: 4, Funny

    ...the Linux kernel will have googlefs support. It will be marked (EXPERIMENTAL), though, and will only run on 10,000-node Babelfish clusters...

    --
    Honey, I shrunk the Cygwin
  16. Re:In case you don't like PDF by Short+Circuit · · Score: 5, Funny

    A ramdisk would make for a great swap partition. :)

    --
    tasks(723) drafts(105) languages(484) examples(29106)
  17. In case you don't like links at all by Bingo+Foo · · Score: 2, Funny

    In case you don't like reading stories and links before posting, remember this is Slashdot.

    --
    taken! (by Davidleeroth) Thanks Bingo Foo!
  18. Google cache by Skreech · · Score: 5, Funny

    In case Google gets slashdotted, here is the Google cache for Google.

    1. Re:Google cache by CableModemSniper · · Score: 3, Funny

      Best part is the disclaimer at the top:

      Google is not affiliated with the authors of this page nor responsible for its content.

      --
      Why not fork?
  19. Re:In case you don't like PDF by bugnuts · · Score: 2, Funny
    How ironic, that the HTML-ized file on Google is available from Yahoo!...


    Yahoo uses the evil Anti-Google FS. It's the 1's complement called GllgOe. It can store 01111111111 1111111111 1111111111 1111111111 1111111111 1111111111 1111111111 1111111111 1111111111 1111111111 bytes of data.

  20. GFS and GWS? by cpopin · · Score: 2, Funny

    They designed their own file system as well as Web server? Did they design their own receptionists? If so, I want to work there!

    --
    -=- Many seek good nights and lose good days.
  21. GooFS? by hajejan · · Score: 2, Funny

    Yeah, that'll definitely sell.

    --
    The Mini Repository - more links
  22. People, people by Epistax · · Score: 2, Funny

    The question really on all our minds is can you play doom on it?