[Samba] smbfs on linux bug with millions of files...

Thibodeau, Jim jthibodeau at state.mt.us
Tue Aug 24 18:29:21 GMT 2004


Hello,
I believe I have discovered a bug within smbfs that only shows up when the
remote filesystem contains millions of files.

When accessing a filesystem with a count in excess of 1.9 million files, I
have noticed that the files all exist, but when attempting to read them
results in a read of 0 bytes.  In other words, smbfs believes that the file
size is 0 bytes.

If I use the ttl=<very large number, like 100,000,000> option when mounting
the file system then I can access the files IF and ONLY IF I go into the
target directory and do a directory listing first.  The application
attempting to access the file directly still results in a 0 byte read if I
do not perform the manual directory listing first.  I have also noticed that
the UNIX find command seems to be enough to allow the reads to work for the
proper file size.

Also, if I use a smaller ttl value, then the reads only work before the ttl
expires.

If you have a work-around (even modifying the kernel code and re-compiling)
for this, I would appreciate your letting me know what it is.  

Otherwise, I hope this will help you to fix this bug in future releases of
smbfs, even though it is probably only rarely a problem.

Also, if I have sent this to the wrong e-mail address, would you either
forward this appropriately or at least let me know that this is the wrong
one, so that I may continue attempting to report this to the appropriate
authority.

Anyway, thanks for your help.

Jim



More information about the samba mailing list