hello

 

at the help for Enable disk shares:  

WARNING: Do not copy data from a disk share to a user share unless you know what you are doing. This may result in the loss of data and is not supported.

 

Could anyone please explain me why is this risky?

 

Right now i have 2 disks

one for data (DISK 1) and one for PARITY.

 

At user shares i made a folder "MOVIES"

and inside i have many other subfolders like this

MOVIES > 90s > BLURAY

                        > DVD

MOVIES > 00s > BLURAY

                        > DVD

etc

 

will i have a problem, if i move files from one folder to another? from 90s to 00s?

Edited June 23, 20179 yr by volume

I recommend you don't enable disk shares so you won't make a mistake in the future. Since you only have one data disk, there is no need to enable them anyway. Just move/copy files only using user shares and you won't have any problems.

 

See here:

 

 

There may be some cases  where it will work properly but there are also cases which will result in data loss.

Edited June 23, 20179 yr by Frank1940

I'm moving from xpenology to unraid. at the final stage of unRAID, i will be with 6 disks (5 data, 1 parity)

i enable disk share at unRAID so from the GUI of xpenology and with remote folder, i copy my data to unRAID.

its the simplest way that i find and works well.

 

 

 

Edited June 23, 20179 yr by volume

What you propose to do with the copying of data from your old server to your new unRAID server will not cause an issue with data loss or corruption. But this should be a one time deal because when you are done, any root directory on any unRAID data drive will automatically become a User Share.  If you have root directories on  different data drives that are named identically, they will be combined into a single User Share.  Having said that, you could have still an issue if you have two files that are different with an identical  file name and path on their respective disks.  One of these files would be 'invisible' to the unRAID User Share.  

When you try to copy a file on top of itself, an OS will tell you that you cannot copy a file on top of itself. Because if it were to allow you to try, the file would get truncated.

 

But with disk shares and user shares, it is possible for you to attempt to copy a file on top of itself and the OS DOES NOT KNOW that is what you are requesting! So it can't prevent you or even warn you. And what happens, the file(s) gets truncated.

 

What makes this more complicated, is the way user shares work. The nuances are many!  Truly removing a disk from a user share is not possible unless you completely understand the nuances. Include and exclude share setting HAVE A VERY LIMITED EFFECT! IN FACT, THE ONLY WAY TO TRULY EXCLUDE A DISK FROM A USER SHARE USING UNRAID SETTINGS IS TO GLOBALLY EXCLUDE THE ENTIRE DISK FROM THE ENTIRE USER SHARE FEATURE.

 

But if you don't understand that, you might think you can simply exclude the disk from a specific user share in that user share settings, and then copy all of the files on the now excluded disk back to the user share. This should spread them to other disks, right? WRONG! THIS DOES NOT WORK. IT IS DEADLY.

This "bug" existed for YEARS before I realized it in a hypothetical sense, and sure enough, on testing it is a real problem. We had some weird data loss scenarios and this turned out to be the cause.

 

Easiest way to avoid it is NEVER mix disk share and user shares in a copy or move operation. And even simpler, don't use disk shares at all.

 

LimeTech knows of the issue, but a very clean solution is elusive. They have added some protections to help avoid it, but it is still possible to encounter this bug, and you don't have to try very hard!

 

Be careful out there!