File server
A file server (or from engl . Fileserver also fileserver called) is a computer , the file system or at least a part of a file system in a computer network provides.
Functions
The main role of a file server is to give multiple users access to files . The access rights are controlled by the server itself or via the file authorizations in the file system.
The central storage of files has the following advantages and reasons:
- with appropriate organization, better overview of existing data
- Avoiding conflicts between different versions of a document
- central assignment of rights for files, very fine-grained with ACLs
- Working groups can work with the same files without them on removable media having to transport
- Possibility of automatic versioning or revision
- Data backups are simpler and cheaper, as data does not have to be backed up individually on each client. With the appropriate file system, logical volume manager or disk array , snapshots can be taken during operation .
A file server can be set up under almost any operating system . File servers are common in Linux distributions , NetWare , Windows and Unix .
Logs
The network protocol used on the Internet is usually FTP , its secure variants SCP and SFTP or WebDAV . In intranets , SMB / CIFS is usually used in Windows and Mac environments, and NFS in Unix environments .
hardware
A file server usually has several large hard disk drives that are connected in a RAID system. Usually special hard disk types are used that are optimized for continuous operation.