I mixed disk shares and user shares while moving data from ZFS disks to unraid disks, how should I proceed?

[96dpi]

I am new to unraid, first time setting this up.

 

I have my shares setup with the cache disabled for now. I installed the ZFS for unraid plugin, then I used putty to ssh into unraid, then I used midnight commander to move files from my ZFS drives onto my unraid drives.

 

For the first couple of passes, I was copying data from the ZFS disk onto /mnt/disk1/<share> and then I realized that I was filling up disk1. So for the next few passes I switched to /mnt/user/<share>

 

Some data started moving to a different disk, but it then switched back to disk1, so I finally stopped it at 86% capacity. 

 

Then I read that I should not mix disk shares and user shares. This is where I am stuck. What happens when you mix disk and user shares? How should I proceed? I still have all of the original data on my ZFS disks. Should I format the unraid drives and try this again? Or is there a better way? 

[trurl]

A better way to say it is you should not mix user shares with disks that are included in user shares.

 

If your ZFS disks are not part of the array or cache they are not included in user shares. 

[96dpi]

I am copying data from unmounted ZFS drives onto the array. Are you saying I didn't do anything wrong? 

29 minutes ago, trurl said:

A better way to say it is you should not mix user shares with disks that are included in user shares.

 

If your ZFS disks are not part of the array or cache they are not included in user shares. 

 

[JonathanM]

9 hours ago, 96dpi said:

I am copying data from unmounted ZFS drives onto the array. Are you saying I didn't do anything wrong? 

 

Correct, what you did was perfectly fine. What you should not do is copy from array shares to array disks and vice versa.

 

If you want to force content from non array disks to be on a specific array disk, it's perfectly ok to copy from non array disks to /mnt/diskX/ShareY. When you copy to /mnt/user/ShareY, you are relying on the share settings to pick the destination disk. Share allocation settings can be tricky to fully understand, so be sure to turn on the help in the GUI for that page and read through each option carefully.

[96dpi]

43 minutes ago, jonathanm said:

Correct, what you did was perfectly fine. What you should not do is copy from array shares to array disks and vice versa.

 

If you want to force content from non array disks to be on a specific array disk, it's perfectly ok to copy from non array disks to /mnt/diskX/ShareY. When you copy to /mnt/user/ShareY, you are relying on the share settings to pick the destination disk. Share allocation settings can be tricky to fully understand, so be sure to turn on the help in the GUI for that page and read through each option carefully.

Okay, that clears things up, thank you! I have one last hang-up...

 

disk1 is at 86% capacity and disk2 and disk3 are each below 10%. What is the best way to distribute the data on disk 1 onto disk2 and disk3?

 

If I browse disk2 & 3 in mc, there is no folder for the share I created where I want to move this data to. Is it safe to create a directory with the same share name and then start moving files into it?

[JonathanM]

5 minutes ago, 96dpi said:

Is it safe to create a directory with the same share name and then start moving files into it?

Yep. That's what a user share is, a root directory on one of the array disks or cache pools.

[96dpi]

2 minutes ago, jonathanm said:

Yep. That's what a user share is, a root directory on one of the array disks or cache pools.

Great, thanks again. You have relieved a lot of stress for me!

[JonathanM]

As long as you understand that a user share IS the files on the disks, just presented in a different view, you can work out what is safe to do and what isn't.

For example, moving a file or folder from /mnt/disk1/share1 to /mnt/user/share1 is going to cause whatever you moved to be corrupted, because the paths are actually pointing to the same thing. Moving from /mnt/disk1/share1 to /mnt/disk3/share1 is perfectly fine. Moving from /mnt/user/share1 to /mnt/user/share2 is perfectly fine as well, but may end up with the files on a disk you didn't expect, since linux first tries a rename and succeeds, so the files will stay on whatever disk they were on to begin with.

 

If you move the files from user share to user share over SMB, they will obey user share allocation rules and go to the disk specified by the destination share.

 

It's a little complex when you first dive in, but if you obey the rule to not mix /mnt/user with array disks, you'll be fine.