[SLL] limit on number of files in a directory and hashed dir vs. flat dir file access time

[Rob Smith]

On 10/31/07, Xeno Campanoli <xcampanoli at gmail.com> wrote:
> implying that the maximum number of links to anything is 32000, which
> limits a directory to 32000 files.

Not true.

That's the number of links to a file, not a inode.

Using this script:
#!/bin/bash

I=0

mkdir /tmp/filetest
cd /tmp/filetest

while [ "$I" -lt "50000" ]
do
 touch $I
 let I=$I+1
done

echo "There is `ls | wc -l` files in this directory"


it creates 50,000 files quite fine.

Now using this script:
#!/bin/bash

mkdir /tmp/linktest
cd /tmp/linktest

touch mainlink

I=0

while [ "$I" -lt "32005" ]
do
 ln mainlink $I
 let I=$I+1
done

it will fail to create the last 6 links, as too many links.

Ext3 will be glad to store trillions of files in a single dir, and
with the dirindex b-tree hashes, it's not all that slow.

~Rob