Synchronous updates on ext3?

[Kevin M. Myer]

I did research on this issue about a year ago when I was about to deploy our
mail server.  About the only thing I found was what you noted - not everyone
agrees on it.  I initially was headed down the reiserfs road until I posted to a
RedHat list and was presented with enough arguments to decide to use ext3
instead.  I had a response from Stephen Tweedie that says that doing fsync() on
a dirty file will cause all entries associated with the file to be flushed to
disk, so that chattr +S should not be necessary (seen at
https://listman.redhat.com/pipermail/roswell-list/2001-September/002338.html)

My original thread about reiserfs and subsequent arguments presented for ext3:

https://listman.redhat.com/pipermail/roswell-list/2001-September/002306.html

This thread speaks more about MTAs but I think its relevant:

http://archives.neohapsis.com/archives/postfix/2001-07/thread.html#1463

I'm not a low-level file system expert but my overall take on it was with
programs that use the proper system calls, chattr +S was not needed with ext3. 
Debates about the merits of what constitutes a "program that uses proper system
calls" aren't intended to be started by the above statement.  Cyrus appears to
use fsync by default, as does postfix so I think both would fit in the category.
 I've been wrong before though...

Kevin

--
Kevin M. Myer
Systems Administrator
Lancaster-Lebanon Intermediate Unit 13
(717) 560-6140