In the shares on the tower, I notice some shares have 'min free space'.

 

      1. What does this reference? ( I looked in the Lime UnRaid manual and did not see any reference)

      2. I have a '0' in some of the fields. I did not put the zeros in so what does this mean?

 

Thanks,

Camel

It sets the minimum amount a free space to be reserved on the disk. Convention is to set it to twice the size of the largest file that you will ever write the the disk. Setting it is required for user shares or you'll eventually get a "disk full" error even though there is still space available in the share (just not on the disk you're attempting to write.)

If you only have "0" in the Min Free Space, which you did not create - that is just a top-level directory.

 

When User Shares are enabled, unRAID OS will automatically create a set of shares named after the top-level directories found on each data disk. If the same top-level directory exists on more than one disk, then the exported share will contain all directories/files under that top-level directory on all the disks.

http://lime-technology.com/wiki/index.php?title=UnRAID_Manual#User_shares

 

See example below:

"movies" - user share I created

"LocalBackup" is a top level directory from another disk, which only exists on that disk. Automatically entered as described above.

I should have mentioned that I did not create it.

 

I was concerned because I did not create it and thought that there would be zero minimum space.

 

So if I create the zero then that will set the amount of free space and if the system defaults to zero without my input, it represents the top level directory?

 

I am going to have to read up on the link this weekend. I may have to follow up with some more questions. But i think it makes sense. I am having newer tasks, criteria, and fields to understand with my new key installed. I now have more functionality which is great but my learning curve just went down and I will have to spend more time to catch up with all the new fantastic options. I wish i could spend more time learning.

 

Thanks for all the help. As long as I get get some direction and answers that I can't find, I will do great with this setup. I feel so much safer and calmer with unraid. After I get squared away with this then I will try to figure out the cache drive-to have or not.

 

All the best,

Camel

I should have mentioned that I did not create it.

 

I was concerned because I did not create it and thought that there would be zero minimum space.

 

So if I create the zero then that will set the amount of free space and if the system defaults to zero without my input, it represents the top level directory?

No, it indicates exactly the same thing.  It indicates the share will not reserve any free space on any disk it uses.  It might result in a file being created where there is insufficient space to hold it in its entirety and an out-of-space error when there is sufficient space on other drives.

It's not that complicated. The min free space is the free space you want on each disk. As you copy to each disk unRAID will move to the next disk when the disk has less free space than this setting. It is set in meg so 20 gig = 20000000 for example.

 

It seems to be automatically set to 0 when you create a share.

 

You really don't need to worry about it much unless you use the fill-up allocation method. The other methods wil keep shifting to different disks as they fill until you get close to having them all full, at which point you would really need to be careful where you put any new files.

 

You can run into times when it doesn't work. For example, the split level may not allow the directory you are filling to split. As another example, the program you are using to move the files to the server may create all the blank directories needed and then you run out of space because those directories are not allowed to split due to the split level.

 

Peter

 

Thanks Joe and lionelhutz.

 

I was just going to link the above explanation of min free space - which I found in a forum search only to realize it was this thread. (and got  distracted with changing my own min free space!)

 

 

FYI, you do need to set the min free space on the cache disk if you will ever fill the disk. Then, when the cache is full unRAID will start using the data disks directly. I have a 500gig cache and only run the mover once a week so it could fill-up even though it's not very likely.

It's not that complicated. The min free space is the free space you want on each disk. As you copy to each disk unRAID will move to the next disk when the disk has less free space than this setting. It is set in meg so 20 gig = 20000000 for example.

Sorry, Wrong...  It is set in kilobytes  (1024 bytes), not megabytes.

 

20000000 * 1024 = 2,441.40625 megabytes or 2GB

 

20000000 * 1024 = 2,441.40625 megabytes or 2GB

 

Yes, kB, not MB. But wrong to you too Joe. You'd better count the zero's again.

 

Actually, I don't get your number above either. 20000000kB would be 20000000 x 2^10 / 2^20 = 19531.25MB. You would need to use 20971520 to truely get 20GB if you really want to stick to the base 2 units.

 

But honestly, who really needs to be that close when you can just add 6 0's to the GB of free space you want and fill in a number that will work.

 

Also, if you want to quibble about this we should be using KiB, GiB and MiB as the units too.

 

Peter

 

 

This is great info for me!

 

At this point, it sounds as though I have nothing to fear because I am using my tower strictly for some backing up and copies of recovery disks/OS's...for Linux, Mac, Windows. I am also hoping to rsync some of my documents using my tower as small repository for some of my off-site pc's.

 

 

I am not concerned where the data lands at this point as I am using high water, so I think my setup is pretty straight forward for now. I am still getting my feet wet and as time goes on I will build another tower for music and movies where I will be more selective about exclusions, free space on shares and drives. I have a small 40G HDD that I have in place for cache but I am thinking I may use a 2T since all the other drives are.

 

I will also build a three disc tower, as I had before I purchased a key, to play around with and experiment these settings. I had no idea that there was so much to work with for customizing a tower. So many flavors, so very impressive. I really look forward to working with my tower when I have time. I am officially a geek now.

 

 

[shadow=red,left]I know it should be easy but I can't get my time machine to see the tower but that is for another thread.

[/shadow]

Out of many forums I have experienced this is one of the most helpful and most classiest.

 

Thanks again for taking the time with so much support in answering my specific questions and having a lot of direct clear info/manuals to read and study. I hope you all get some compensation...

 

Hear comes the smoke...[move]you all are the best and so damn [move]intelligent[/move][/move][move][glow=red,2,300][/glow][/move]

 

All the best,

Camel

I should have mentioned that I did not create it.

 

I was concerned because I did not create it and thought that there would be zero minimum space.

 

So if I create the zero then that will set the amount of free space and if the system defaults to zero without my input, it represents the top level directory?

No, it indicates exactly the same thing.   It indicates the share will not reserve any free space on any disk it uses.  It might result in a file being created where there is insufficient space to hold it in its entirety and an out-of-space error when there is sufficient space on other drives.

 

so for those of us that need a recap ... it IS recommended to have a free space on each disk or you will get and out of space error if certain disks are full???... is it not intelligent (sorry maybe bad word) enough to make sure this does not happen?

This setting is how you instruct the server not to let this happen. See my previous post.

This setting is how you instruct the server not to let this happen. See my previous post.

 

i am not doubting what you said, it's just not written into law (FAQ or best practices with unRAID) anywhere.... (or did i miss it.?)