[cifs-protocol] CIFS/NFS performance of netapp filer vs local dir

[Joseph Kuan]

As far as I know, CIFS is a wordy protocol the reason is because it is a 
protocol originally designed not for many purposes.

The main reason of poor network throughput because when you open a file, 
is not a simple open, read, and close. It sends lots of TRANS2 packets 
and the same file open and close several times before reading the whole 
files, lot of other weird network operations such as NTFS data stream 
checks.

For small files, you probably see 3-10 times more packets transferred 
across the wire than the NFS. I think the performance difference may 
also depending on what type of file you are trying to open. For big 
files, (my very wild guess) you may see the performance difference 
converging to certain factor which is still more than NFS.

The difference is even more when you open a network directory.

I am in the middle of the process documenting on this issue. Will let 
you know more details in near future (if you are interested).



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