Folder Caching - What are the Ultimate Settings?

[fawzib]

I have 128GB of ECC RAM and obviously this is not a problem. I want to adjust my settings so my folder structure data are always stored in memory. The problem is that randomly the system wakes up my drives even when no docker/vm is active.

 

I set the below settings based on the description:

cache_pressure = 0

Limit the memory available to the shell in which the script runs (increase if it dies): 0

 

 

What about the rest of those settings? I'm geniunely confused and assume that 100% up to date folder structure is not an issue since it is a plex server. what settings should I adjust the below if the goal is to minimize spinning up the drives.

 

Minimum level depth (for adaptive depth):

Maximum level depth:

Disk Idle Timer (sec):

Scan timeout for a scan during disk-idle period (sec):

Scan timeout for a scan during initial startup or less-idle period (sec):

Scan timeout for a scan when all directories have been succesfully cached (sec):

Minimum interval between folder scans (sec):

Maximum interval between folder scans (sec):

Run scan of each disk in a separate thread:

 

Edited March 13 by fawzib

[itimpi]

Probably the most important setting to get correct is that you normally want to only include the folders/shares you really want to be scanned, but you do not mention that setting.

[fawzib]

i only scanned my media and not everything. but my media is around 400,000 files. also what should the depth be if i want to index all folders and what about various timeout settings?

[Frank1940]

14 minutes ago, fawzib said:

but my media is around 400,000 file

 You have to realize that this info is stored in free RAM.  As I recall, it has a very low priority on RAM usage.  When it fills up (or more RAM is required by other processes), it will toss away the oldest data.  This can cause constant disk spin up.  (I use the Cache Directories plugin on my Media server-- but not my Backup server --but I scan  less than 5000 items out probably 500,000. I have a very simple setup.  It seems to work well for my use case.)  You can throw RAM at it by increasing installed RAM.  You can look at limiting it to caching the items that you really want to see regularly.  In my opinion, it will never work well if you are trying to cache 400,000 items.  (This script was written back around 2010 and I don't believe that its code base has changed much since then except to fix issues cause by updates to the kernel.)

[fawzib]

without the plugin, everytime i open any folder via terminal or smb it will wakeup the drive.  i was wondering what are the apropriate settings for min and max depth and what do they really mean. is there a timeout for this cache, etc..

[Frank1940]

Start by looking at this thread:

   

I know this is not answering your questions but I don't know if anyone today has the answers you are looking for.  @Joe L. has not been online since 2019 and was MIA a few years before that.

[fawzib]

@Frank1940 I appreciate your answers and putting the effort into understanding my concern. I will stay on the lookout and hopefully one day someone can either pickup the plugin or provide a better solution.