 A file system is a method of organizing files on physical media, such as hard disks, CD's,

and flash drives. In the Microsoft Windows family of operating systems, users are presented
with several different choices of file systems when formatting such media. These choices
depend on the type of media involved and the situations in which the media is being
formatted.
 The two most common file systems in Windows are as follows:
 NTFS
 FAT
 exFAT
 HFS Plus
 EXT

The NTFS file system

1. NTFS (short for New Technology File System) is a modern, well-formed file system that
is most commonly used by Windows Vista, 7 & 8. It has feature-rich, yet simple
organization that allows it to be used on very large volumes.
2. NTFS has the following properties:
 NTFS partitions can extend up to 16EB (about 16 million TB).
 Files stored to NTFS partitions can be as large as the partition.
 NTFS partitions occasionally become fragmentented and should be defragmented every
one to two months.
 NTFS partitions can be read from and written to by Windows and Linux systems and,
can only be read from by Mac OS X systems (by default). Mac OS X, with the
assistance of the NTFS-3G driver, can write to NTFS partitions. Installation
instructions for the NTFS-3G driver can be found here: Mac OS X - Writing to NTFS
Drives
3. It is recommended that NTFS be used on all media whose use is primarily with modern
Windows systems. It should not be used for devices which need to be written to by Mac
OS X systems or on media that is used in devices which are not compatible with NTFS.

The FAT file system

1. The FAT (short for File Allocation Table) file system is a general purpose file system that
is compatible with all major operating systems (Windows, Mac OS X, and Linux/Unix).
2. It has relatively simple technical underpinnings, and was the default file system for all
Windows operating systems prior to Windows 2000.
3. Because of its overly simplistic structure, FAT suffers from issues such as over-
fragmentation, file corruption, and limits to file names and size.
4. The FAT file system has the following properties:
 FAT partitions cannot extend beyond 2TB. NOTE: Windows cannot format a disc
larger than 32 GB to FAT32, but Mac OS X can.
 Files stored to a FAT partition cannot exceed 4GB.
 FAT partitions need to be defragmented often to maintain reasonable performance.
 FAT partitions larger than 32GB are generally not recommended as that amount of
space starts to overwhelm FAT's overly simplistic organization structure.
5. FAT is generally only used for devices with small capacity where portability between
operating systems is paramount. When choosing a file system for a hard disk, FAT is not
recommend unless you are using an older version of Windows.
NOTE: This section refers to the FAT32 file system. Some early versions of Windows 95 used
the FAT16 file system, which had even more technical issues and stricter limitations. It is
recommended that FAT16 is never used on any modern media.
The exFAT file system
1. The exFAT (Extended File Allocation Table) is a Microsoft file system that is compatible
with Windows and Mac OS 10.6+. It is also compatible with many media devices such as
TVs and portable media players.
2. exFAT has the following properties:
 exFAT partitions can extend up extremely large disc sizes. 512 TiB is the recommended
maximum.
 Files up to 16 EiB can be stored on an exFAT partition.
 exFAT is not compatible with Linux/Unix.
 exFAT partitions should be defragmented often.
 exFAT cannot pre-allocate disk space.

The HFS Plus file system

HFS (Hierarchical File System) Plus is a file system developed by Apple for Mac OS X.
It is also referred to as Mac OS Extended.
HFS Plus has the following properties:
 Maximum volume is 8 EB (about 8 million TB).
 Files stored to HFS+ partitions can be as large as the partition.
 Windows users can read HFS+ but not write.
 Drivers are available that allow Linux users to read and writer to HFS+ volumes.

The EXT file system

1. The extended file system was created to be used with the Linux kernel. EXT 4 is the
most recent version of EXT.
2. EXT4 has the following properties:
 EXT4 can support volumes up to 1 EiB.
 16 TB maximum file size.
 Red Hat recommends using XFS (not EXT4) for volumes over 100 TB.
 EXT4 is backwards compatible with EXT2 and EXT3.
 EXT4 can pre-allocate disk space.
 By default, Windows and Mac OS cannot read EXT file systems.

 File systems can differ between operating systems (OS), such as Microsoft Windows,
MacOS and Linux-based systems. Some file systems are designed for specific applications.
Major types of file systems include distributed file systems, disk-based file systems and
special purpose file systems.
 A file system is a process that manages how and where data on a storage disk, typically a
hard disk drive (HDD), is stored, accessed and managed. It is a logical disk component that
manages a disk's internal operations as it relates to a computer and is abstract to a human
user.

Files in the operating system are of following types −

1. Ordinary files
Ordinary files help to store information like text, graphics, images, etc. These files are used to
store information fed by the user. Examples of ordinary files include a notepad, paint,
programming applications, etc.
2. Directory files
Directory files are nothing but a place/area/location where details of files are stored. It contains
details about file names, ownership, file size and time when they are created and last modified.
3. Device files
Device files are also called as special files. They are created by operating system which act as
a mediator between the operating system and hardware like printers, plotters, etc., and are
stored under a sub-directory, "/dev".
4. FIFO files
FIFO files act as an input/output channel between processes. As the name indicates, it
maintains order of request and response to files by user or any other device.

 FAT is an acronym for File Allocation Table and the 16 indicates a 16-bit file system.
The file system was initially developed for use on floppy

 The FAT used for most older systems, used a 16-bit binary number to hold cluster
numbers. A volume using FAT16 can hold a maximum of 65,526 clusters, FAT16 was
used for hard disk volumes ranging in size from 16 MB to 2,048 MB. VFAT is a variant
of FAT16.

 FAT32 is supported by Windows 95's OEM SR2 release, as well as Windows 98,
Windows ME and Windows 2000. FAT32 uses a 28-bit binary cluster number--not 32,
because 4 of the 32 bits are "reserved". FAT32 can theoretically handle volumes with
over 268 million clusters, and will support (theoretically) drives up to 2 TB in size.

 First, FAT32, being a 32-bit file system, supports much larger disks than the FAT16
file system. FAT16 supports a maximum volume size of 4 GB, while FAT32 can be
used on volumes up to 16 TB.

 Maximum volume size depends on FAT type: FAT12: 256MB (for 64kB clusters)
FAT16: 4GB (for 64kB clusters) FAT32: 2TB (4G of 512B sectors)

 NT file system (NTFS), which is also sometimes called the New Technology File
System, is a process that the Windows NT operating system uses for storing,
organizing, and finding files on a hard disk efficiently.
 NTFS supports metadata, advanced data structures, reliability, disk space utilization.
And more additional functions like encrypting file system, hard links, sparse files, and
reparse points. If you only use a Windows computer, it is recommended to use NTFS
format.
 NTFS can support volumes as large as 8 petabytes on Windows Server 2019 and newer
and Windows 10, version 1709 and newer (older versions support up to 256 TB).

 NTFS and FAT32 file systems differ in the following ways: The FAT32 file system
cannot store individual files larger than 4 GB, while the NTFS file system can.
Compared to FAT32, the NTFS file system has higher disk utilization and can manage
disk space more effectively.
Unix File System
 UNIX file system is a logical method of organizing and storing large amounts of
information in a way that makes it easy to manage.
 A file is a smallest unit in which the information is stored.
 UNIX file system has several important features.
 All data in UNIX is organized into files.
 All files are organized into directories.
 These directories are organized into a tree-like structure called the file system.
 Files in Unix System are organized into multi-level hierarchy structure known as a
directory tree.
 At the very top of the file system is a directory called “root” which is represented by
a “/”. All other files are “descendants” of root.
 The UNIX file system is a hierarchical file system used by Unix-based operating systems
to store and organize files and directories. It is a tree-like structure that starts with a single
directory called the root directory, which is denoted by a forward slash (/) character.
 The UNIX file system uses a directory hierarchy that allows for easy navigation and
organization of files. Directories can contain both files and other directories, and each
file or directory has a unique name.
 UNIX file system also uses a set of permissions to control access to files and directories.
Each file and directory has an owner and a group associated with it, and permissions can
be set to allow or restrict access to these entities.
 One of the most important features of the UNIX file system is its support for symbolic
links, which are pointers to other files or directories. This allows for flexible organization
of files and directories without having to physically move them around.
 Overall, the UNIX file system is a robust and flexible system that has been used for
decades and continues to be the foundation for many modern operating systems.

Directories or Files and their description –

 / : The slash / character alone denotes the root of the filesystem tree.
 /bin : Stands for “binaries” and contains certain fundamental utilities, such as ls or cp,
which are generally needed by all users.
 /boot : Contains all the files that are required for successful booting process.
 /dev : Stands for “devices”. Contains file representations of peripheral devices and
pseudo-devices.
 /etc. : Contains system-wide configuration files and system databases. Originally also
contained “dangerous maintenance utilities” such as init,but these have typically been
moved to /sbin or elsewhere.
 /home : Contains the home directories for the users.
 /lib : Contains system libraries, and some critical files such as kernel modules or device
drivers.
 /media: Default mount point for removable devices, such as USB sticks, media players,
etc.
 /mnt: Stands for “mount”. Contains filesystem mount points. These are used, for
example, if the system uses multiple hard disks or hard disk partitions. It is also often
used for remote (network) filesystems, CD-ROM/DVD drives, and so on.
 /proc: procfs virtual filesystem showing information about processes as files.
 /root: The home directory for the super user “root” – that is, the system administrator.
This account’s home directory is usually on the initial filesystem, and hence not in /home
(which may be a mount point for another filesystem) in case specific maintenance needs
to be performed, during which other filesystems are not available. Such a case could
occur, for example, if a hard disk drive suffers physical failures and cannot be properly
mounted.
 /tmp: A place for temporary files. Many systems clear this directory upon startup; it
might have tmpfs mounted atop it, in which case its contents do not survive a reboot, or
it might be explicitly cleared by a startup script at boot time.
 /usr: Originally the directory holding user home directories, its use has changed. It now
holds executables, libraries, and shared resources that are not system critical, like the X
Window System, KDE, Perl, etc. However, on some UNIX systems, some user accounts
may still have a home directory that is a direct subdirectory of /usr, such as the default as
in Minix. (On modern systems, these user accounts are often related to server or system
use, and not directly used by a person).
 /usr/bin : This directory stores all binary programs distributed with the operating system
not residing in /bin, /sbin or (rarely) /etc.
 /usr/include: Stores the development headers used throughout the system. Header files
are mostly used by the #include directive in C/C++ programming language.
 /usr/lib: Stores the required libraries and data files for programs stored within /usr or
elsewhere.
 /var: A short for “variable.” A place for files that may change often – especially in size,
for example e-mail sent to users on the system, or process-ID lock files.
 /var/log: Contains system log files.
 /var/mail
 : The place where all the incoming mails are stored. Users (other than root) can access
their own mail only. Often, this directory is a symbolic link to /var/spool/mail.
 /var/spool: Spool directory. Contains print jobs, mail spools and other queued tasks.
 /var/tmp: A place for temporary files which should be preserved between system
reboots.

Types of Unix files

1. Ordinary files – An ordinary file is a file on the system that contains data, text, or program
instructions.
 Used to store your information, such as some text you have written or an image you
have drawn. This is the type of file that you usually work with.
 Always located within/under a directory file.
 Do not contain other files.
 In long-format output of ls -l, this type of file is specified by the “-” symbol.
2. Directories – Directories store both special and ordinary files. For users familiar with
Windows or Mac OS, UNIX directories are equivalent to folders.
A directory file contains an entry for every file and subdirectory that it houses. If you have
10 files in a directory, there will be 10 entries in the directory. Each entry has two
components. (1) The Filename (2) A unique identification number for the file or directory
(called the inode number)
 Branching points in the hierarchical tree.
 Used to organize groups of files.
 May contain ordinary files, special files or other directories.
 Never contain “real” information which you would work with (such as text). Basically,
just used for organizing files.
 All files are descendants of the root directory, (named /) located at the top of the tree.
In long-format output of ls –l, this type of file is specified by the “d” symbol.

3. Special Files – Used to represent a real physical device such as a printer, tape drive or
terminal, used for Input/output (I/O) operations. Device or special files are used for device
Input/Output (I/O) on UNIX and Linux systems. They appear in a file system just like an
ordinary file or a directory. On UNIX systems there are two flavours of special files for each
device, character special files and block special files:
 When a character special file is used for device Input/output (I/O), data is transferred one
character at a time. This type of access is called raw device access.
 When a block special file is used for device Input/Output
 (I/O), data is transferred in large fixed-size blocks. This type of access is called block
device access.
For terminal devices, it’s one character at a time. For disk devices though, raw access means
reading or writing in whole chunks of data – blocks, which are native to your disk.
 In long-format output of ls -l, character special files are marked by the “c” symbol.
 In long-format output of ls -l, block special files are marked by the “b” symbol.

5. Pipes – UNIX allows you to link commands together using a pipe.

 The pipe acts a temporary file which only exists to hold data from one command
until it is read by another.
 A UNIX pipe provides a one-way flow of data. The output or result of the first
command sequence is used as the input to the second command sequence.
 To make a pipe, put a vertical bar (|) on the command line between two commands.
For example: who | wc -l In long-format output of ls –l, named pipes are marked
by the “p” symbol.

6. Sockets –
 A UNIX socket (or Inter-process communication socket) is a special file which allows
for advanced inter-process communication.
 A Unix Socket is used in a client-server application framework. In essence, it is a
stream of data, very similar to network stream (and network sockets), but all the
transactions are local to the filesystem.
 In long-format output of ls -l, UNIX sockets are marked by “s” symbol.
7. Symbolic Link
 Symbolic link is used for referencing some other file of the file system.
 Symbolic link is also known as Soft link. It contains a text form of the path to the file
it references.
 To an end user, symbolic link will appear to have its own name, but when you try
reading or writing data to this file, it will instead reference these operations to the
file it points to. If we delete the soft link itself, the data file would still be there. If
we delete the source file or move it to a different location, symbolic file will not
function properly. In long-format output of ls –l, Symbolic link are marked by the
“l” symbol (that’s a lower case L).

Advantages or Disadvantages:

Advantages of the UNIX file system include:

1. Hierarchical organization: The hierarchical structure of the UNIX file system makes it
easy to organize and navigate files and directories.
2. Robustness: The UNIX file system is known for its stability and reliability. It can handle
large amounts of data without becoming unstable or crashing.
3. Security: The UNIX file system uses a set of permissions that allows administrators to
control who has access to files and directories.
4. Compatibility: The UNIX file system is widely used and supported, which means that
files can be easily transferred between different Unix-based systems.

Disadvantages of the UNIX file system include:

1. Complexity: The UNIX file system can be complex to understand and manage, especially
for users who are not familiar with the command line interface.
2. Steep learning curve: Users who are not familiar with Unix-based systems may find it
difficult to learn how to use the UNIX file system.
3. Lack of user-friendly interface: The Unix file system is primarily managed through the
command line interface, which may not be as user-friendly as a graphical user interface.
4. Limited support for certain file systems: While the UNIX file system is compatible with
many file systems, there are some file systems that are not fully supported.
Ext2 stands for second extended file system. Ext3 stands for third extended file system. Ext4
stands for fourth extended file system. It was introduced in 1993. Developed by Remy Card.

RAID:
 The Full Form of RAID is Redundant Array of Inexpensive/Independent Disks.
 It is a process of data visualisation, which utilises numerous solid-state drive (SSD) or
hard drives, thus enabling redundancy of data and improvement of performance.
 In the instance of any unexpected incidents, the data also encounters threat resilience
because of redundancy. This enables benefits for the traditional storage process, such as
the SLED (Single Large Expensive Disk). Hence, instead of retaining the entire data in
one SLED, RAID enables the use of more than one small sized disks that permits quicker
I/O functions while providing a kind of strength to the whole system.
 If ever any one of the system’s disk crash, others remain protected and safe, thus saving
the complete system from collapsing.

History of RAID
 1988- “A Case for Redundant Arrays of Inexpensive Disks (RAID)” a technical report
by David Patterson, Randy Katz, and Garth A. Gibson published.
 Discussions and mentions of RAID in the report
 It further establishes the resilience and reliability of RAID in comparison to just one
disk.

Characteristics of RAID
 Redundant Data – Multiple disks are used to store information, and this data is copied
and are stored in various locations or disks to enable better disaster management.
 Stored in various disks– As an alternative to the single large disk, RAID keeps the
data stored in numerous small disks that are less expensive.
 Enable multiple storage process– Different RAID uses various storing methods such
as striping, mirroring the parity to enable multiple characteristics for the users.
 Numerous or Multiple Systems– RAID is provided in six different levels, thus
allowing for some unique characteristics, while also compromising on some features.
Finally, the user has the authority to confirm their requirement and then decide what
the applicable features are in their system.
Benefits of RAID
 Speedy data access- The speed of data access RAID systems is definitely more than
that of SLED systems. RAID 0, RAID 4 and RAID 5 are especially designed, thus
enabling quick data access at reasonable rates.
 Data Redundancy– Because of the data redundancy feature of the RAID systems, the
data storage is reliable. RAID 1 makes use of a data mirroring method to store the copies
of data to ensure reliability.
 Correction of Errors– RAID 2, RAID 3, RAID 4 and RAID 5 apply hamming code
parity to correct the error in data.
 I/O requests simultaneously: RAID 0, RAID 4 and RAID 5 apply the striping storage
methods and so it supports multiple I/O operations, simultaneously.
 Data transfer in bulk– RAID 3 allows for speedy transfer of bulk data.
 Security of Data- Striping and ongoing parity checks enable high data security.

Limitations of RAID
 Expensive-RAID systems cost more than SLED systems.
 Loss of data-Vulnerability of RAID systems, which do not utilise mirroring, will
enable data loss.
 Selection of RAID level- Since there are multiple RAID levels, with each having
specific drawbacks and features, it is difficult to select what system should be used.
 Not used properly- The complete system performance may decrease, if the RAID is
not utilised properly.
 Complex technology- RAID is a complex data storage architecture and needs an adept
and competent person to unlock the total potential of RAID.