We introduce external synchrony, a new model for local \u0002file I\/O that provides the reliability and simplicity of synchronous I\/O, yet also closely approximates the performance of asynchronous I\/O. An external observer cannot distinguish the output of a computer with an externally synchronous file system from the output of a computer with a synchronous file system. No application modi\u0002fication is required to use an externally synchronous \u0002file system: in fact, application developers can program to the simpler synchronous I\/O abstraction and still receive excellent performance. We have implemented an externally synchronous fi\u0002le system for Linux, called xsyncfs. Xsyncfs provides the same durability and ordering guarantees as those provided by a synchronously mounted ext3 \u0002file system. Yet, even for I\/O-intensive benchmarks, xsyncfs performance is within 7% of ext3 mounted asynchronously. Compared to ext3 mounted synchronously, xsyncfs is up to two orders of magnitude faster.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
We introduce external synchrony, a new model for local \u0002file I\/O that provides the reliability and simplicity of synchronous I\/O, yet also closely approximates the performance of asynchronous I\/O. An external observer cannot distinguish the output of a computer with an externally synchronous file system from the output of a computer with a synchronous file […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":0,"template":"","meta":{"msr-url-field":"","msr-podcast-episode":"","msrModifiedDate":"","msrModifiedDateEnabled":false,"ep_exclude_from_search":false,"_classifai_error":"","footnotes":""},"msr-content-type":[3],"msr-research-highlight":[],"research-area":[13547],"msr-publication-type":[193716],"msr-product-type":[],"msr-focus-area":[],"msr-platform":[],"msr-download-source":[],"msr-locale":[268875],"msr-post-option":[],"msr-field-of-study":[],"msr-conference":[],"msr-journal":[],"msr-impact-theme":[],"msr-pillar":[],"class_list":["post-154825","msr-research-item","type-msr-research-item","status-publish","hentry","msr-research-area-systems-and-networking","msr-locale-en_us"],"msr_publishername":"","msr_edition":"","msr_affiliation":"","msr_published_date":"2006-10-1","msr_host":"","msr_duration":"","msr_version":"","msr_speaker":"","msr_other_contributors":"","msr_booktitle":"","msr_pages_string":"","msr_chapter":"","msr_isbn":"","msr_journal":"","msr_volume":"","msr_number":"","msr_editors":"","msr_series":"","msr_issue":"","msr_organization":"","msr_how_published":"","msr_notes":"Best Paper","msr_highlight_text":"","msr_release_tracker_id":"","msr_original_fields_of_study":"","msr_download_urls":"","msr_external_url":"","msr_secondary_video_url":"","msr_longbiography":"","msr_microsoftintellectualproperty":1,"msr_main_download":"208921","msr_publicationurl":"","msr_doi":"","msr_publication_uploader":[{"type":"file","viewUrl":"https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/en-us\/research\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/02\/syncio.pdf","id":"208921","title":"syncio.pdf","label_id":"243109","label":0}],"msr_related_uploader":"","msr_attachments":[{"id":208921,"url":"https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/en-us\/research\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/02\/syncio.pdf"}],"msr-author-ordering":[{"type":"text","value":"Peter M. 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