
Testing out snapshots in Apple’s next-generation APFS file system - Garbage
https://arstechnica.com/apple/2017/02/testing-out-snapshots-in-apples-next-generation-apfs-file-system/
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fit2rule
Wow. Came for the APFS next-gen shit, left with a ton of DTrace knowledge and
inspiration to learn more techniques like this ..

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jhoechtl
How does APFS relate to BTRFS or XFS?

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lee_ars
It's intended to occupy the same "next-gen" niche and has a whole smattering
of similar features (64-bit inodes, copy on write, atomicity, write
coalescing, snaps and clones, fast opportunistic locking, native encryption
options, some thin provisioning, checksumming).

It's also currently very beta. The management tools are currently CLI-only; it
can't be used on a boot volume; it's case-sensitive (not case-preserving, but
actual-for-real case-sensitive); it checksums metadata but not all file data.

Apple intends for it to be their whole-ecosystem file system (and it's already
showing up in iOS - [https://arstechnica.com/apple/2017/01/ios-10-3-will-be-
apple...](https://arstechnica.com/apple/2017/01/ios-10-3-will-be-apples-first-
update-to-convert-storage-to-apfs/)), and the rollout will be fun to keep an
eye on.

Today, APFS is an interesting beta project and if you're an apple
developer—especially one whose apps do more than casual manipulation of the
file system—you should start getting your hands dirty with it. From an end-
user perspective, getting proper support of snaps and clones will be a welcome
relief, especially since it seems blindingly obvious that APFS snaps will
replace Time Machine's current mess of links.

But yeah, it's beta. You can't use it in production yet (can't even boot off
of it). Will need to wait until later this year to get a more mature version
of it before it can be adequately benchmarked and evaluated in prod.

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mikhailt
Does anyone actually know for sure if Apple ever updated the APFS preview code
since WWDC seed? I feel like we're like 2-3 years behind of Apple right now on
the status of APFS for macOS.

The fact that it's booting right now on iOS devices with 10.3 Beta with zero
issues should tell us that the current APFS build at Apple is already way
ahead of what we know about it and Apple did announce that all platforms will
be using APFS this year.

So I'm wondering if they're going to release the final preview in 10.12.x at
all or it'll be in 10.13 and auto-converted like iOS 10.3.

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galad87
Yes they did, and APFS volumes created with the WWDC seed are no longer
compatible with the latest release.

