Mounting mqueue.in as a tempfs...on FreeBSD

Michael Baird mike at TC3NET.COM
Tue Mar 23 23:30:40 GMT 2004


So yes, if this person mounts mqueue.in as a tmpfs as was his question,
and the machine crashes, mqueue.in is lost, referring to my own
experience using tmpfs and the FAQ referenced by the link
http://www.sng.ecs.soton.ac.uk/cgi-bin/faq?_highlightWords=tmpfs&file=120,
Specifically the Julian Field post, where he post "With tmpfs-based
directories for mqueue.in mqueue MailScanner/incoming this increases to
about 1.5 million messages per day, using the same settings. This is not
safe as the mqueue.in and.mqueue would be lost on power-outs. So if you
have the RAM to throw at it, and plenty of CPU horse-power to make use
of it, you can increase your message throughput by roughly 30% by moving
the MailScanner/incoming directory onto a tmpfs filesystem held in RAM"

If you know of a different FAQ that says otherwise please let me know,
or if you have some magic way of having tmpfs survive a reboot (like an
Amiga RAD disk), please point me to it, and I will stand corrected.

Regards
MIKE

> Michael Baird wrote:
> > It's much faster, there is a MailScanner FAQ about using tmpfs and the
> > speed advantages, yes there is the risk of losing mail if the machine
> > crashes.
>
> Maybe you should read the FAQ you're recommending? ;-) There's no risk
> of losing mail since the MTA is responsible for the mail at all times.
> MS only works with copies of the mail, the original exists in mqueue.in
> and/or mqueue at all times. The worst thing that can happen is that MS
> has to start over with the batch it was processing when the server windowed.
>
> --
> /Peter Bonivart
>
> --Unix lovers do it in the Sun
>
> Sun Fire V210, Solaris 9, Sendmail 8.12.10, MailScanner 4.25-14,
> SpamAssassin 2.63 + DCC 1.2.30, ClamAV 0.67 + GMP 4.1.2, MailStats 0.25
>



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