List of file systems

This is a list of file systems . File systems are used on computers to store files in a structured manner in directories .

File systems for disks

These file systems use various means to ensure that the data is stored in a meaningful manner on data carriers. In doing so, they often go into the special properties of data carriers. Most of them originate from a certain operating system or a certain computer platform and are often specialized in a certain way and as a result were or are mainly used there. Nevertheless, these can also be accessed from external systems, provided the operating system supports this directly or the operating system is enabled via appropriate driver software . Exceptions are file systems that support extended authorization, offer the option of encryption , or the exact functionality of which is a trade secret (e.g. NTFS).

Many early operating systems (for example CP / M , Apple DOS , Commodore DOS ) each had only one file system that did not have its own name. If necessary, these are to be identified more precisely with the manufacturer.

File systems for hard drives

The following file systems were or are primarily used on hard drives . They are each classified according to the primary target operating system.

Amiga

• FFS ( Amiga Fast File System ): file system under AmigaOS from version 1.3 (not to be confused with Berkeley FFS )
• IceFS - optional freeware file system for MorphOS
• JXFS: file system under AmigaOS from version 4.1
• OFS ( Old / Original File System ): used in AmigaOS up to and including version 1.3, originally Amiga File System
• PFS ( Professional File System ): AmigaOS file system - atomic storage type
• SFS ( Amiga Smart File System ): Can be used from AmigaOS 3.x, standard file system under MorphOS

Apple

• Apple DOS : disk-based file system for the Apple II
• Apple SOS : Further development of Apple DOS for the Apple III , for floppy disks (5.25 ″ and 3.5 ″) and hard disks (Apple ProFile 5 MB and 10 MB)
• Apple ProDOS : file system of the late Apple II models (Apple IIe and Apple IIgs), file system compatible with Apple SOS
• MFS ( Macintosh File System ): hierarchical file system with Macintosh -specific properties, on early Macintosh models (Macintosh 128 and Macintosh 512)
• HFS ( Hierarchical File System ): hierarchical file system with Macintosh-specific properties, on Macintosh models from 1986 (from Macintosh Plus)
• HFS + : further developed variant of HFS with journaling and more generous restrictions on file sizes, volume sizes, etc., standard under Mac OS 8.1 to macOS 10.12
  • HFSX : Variant of HFS + with a distinction between uppercase and lowercase letters , standard up to iOS 10.2
• APFS ( Apple File System ): Successor to HFS +, standard since iOS 10.3 and macOS 10.13 (only with macOS 10.14 also on Fusion Drive )

RiscOS and Acorn

• DFS ( Disc Filing System ): Acorn's non- hierarchical disk file system (not to be confused with Microsoft DFS )
• ADFS ( Advanced Disc Filing System ): further developed variant of DFS with hierarchy and fragmentation, under RISC OS

Haiku and BeOS

• BFS ( Be File System ): Standard file system under BeOS
• OpenBFS ( Open Be File System ): further developed variant of BFS, associative journaling file system

Linux

• btrfs ( Btree File System ) - a so-called copy-on-write file system, which offers the possibility of creating so-called snapshots
• EcryptFS ( Enterprise Cryptographic Filesystem ) - an encrypting file system with support in the Linux kernel
• EncFS ( Encrypted File System ) - a FUSE- based, encrypting userland file system
• ext ( Extended File System ) - variant of the minix file system further developed for Linux
• ext2 ( Second Extended File System ) - further developed variant of ext with extended limits; was the standard file system on Linux for a long time
• ext3 ( Third Extended File System ) - further developed variant of ext2 with journaling
• ext3cow ( Third Extended File System with Copy-On-Write ) - further developed variant of ext3 with copy-on-write functionality
• ext4 ( Fourth Extended File System ) - further developed variant of ext3, u. a. with extended limits
• FTPFS - a kernel module based on FTP ; was replaced by LUFS / FUSE or CurlFtpFS around 2005
• Next3 - file system based on ext3 , which offers the possibility of creating so-called snapshots
• NILFS ( New Implementation of a Log-structured File System ) - a logging file system from NTT
• NILFS2 - further developed variant of NILFS
• OrangeFS - a distributed (or parallel ) file system, which on the Parallel Virtual File System builds
• ReiserFS - a journaling file system from Namesys
• Reiser4 - a journaling file system with efficient storage and plugin support, from Namesys
• Tux3 - a versioning file system

Microsoft

• FAT12 : early file system of the FAT ( File Allocation Table ) file system family under ROM-BASIC and MS-DOS, still used today for floppy disks (supported by almost every operating system)
• FAT16 : newer variant in the FAT file system family with extended limits compared to FAT12 (is supported by almost every operating system)
• FAT32 : newer variant of the FAT file system family with extended limits compared to FAT16, from Windows 95b or Windows 2000 (is supported by newer operating systems)
• exFAT : version of FAT32 specializing in flash memory use
• FATX: specialized variant of FAT16 / FAT32 for the Xbox
• NTFS ( N ew T echnology F ile S ystem ): Journaling file system of the Windows NT product line, there the standard file system .
• ReFS ( Re silient F ile S ystem ; German Robustes Filesystem ): New file system, introduced with Windows 8, based on B + trees
• VFAT ( V irtual FAT ): Optional extension of FAT12 / FAT16 / FAT32 to ensure support for long file names and special characters, from Windows 95

NetWare

• NetWare File System: Standard file system for Netware versions 2 to 5
• NSS ( Novell Storage Services ): Journaling file system in NetWare from version 5

OS / 2

• JFS ( journal file system ): journaling file system of IBM
• HPFS ( High Performance File System ): file system with metadata support

QNX

• Qnx4fs ( QNX 4 File System ): Standard file system from QNX version 4
• Qnx6fs ( QNX 6 File System ): File system in QNX versions from 6.4

UNIX

• AdvFS ( Tru64 Unix Advanced File System ): Journaling file system on Tru64 UNIX
• AFS ( Acer Fast Filesystem ): File system under SCO OpenServer (not to be confused with Andrew File System )
• DTFS ( Desktop File System ): File system with compression under SCO OpenServer
• EAFS ( Extended Acer File System ): further developed variant of AFS, under SCO Unix
• EFS ( Extent File System ): File system under IRIX , predecessor of XFS
• FFS ( Berkeley Fast File System ): variant of UFS under BSD (not to be confused with Amiga FFS)
• HTFS ( High Throughput File System ): Standard file system under SCO OpenServer
• LFS ( Log-structured File System ): a further developed variant of UFS with logging functionality
• minix : file system of the operating system of the same name
• s5fs ( System V File System ): the classic file system of the System V Unix from AT&T
• UFS (Unix File System ): used under Solaris and BSD
• VxFS ( Veritas Journaling File System ): Journaling file system from VERITAS, standard file system under HP-UX
• XFS : journaling file system from SGI primarily for IRIX (not be confused with xFS)
• ZFS ( Zetta File System ) file system far-reaching limits and diverse volume management, from Sun Microsystems for Solaris written

Others

• AthFS ( AtheOS File System ): further developed variant of BFS with journaling, under AtheOS
• CBMFS ( Commodore Business Machines File System ): on Commodore 64 floppy disks, etc. A. with the VC1541 .
• Files-11: Standard file system under OpenVMS
• Fossil: Standard file system under Plan 9
• Lessfs: Specially optimized file system for the use of backups. So far only through FUSE.
• MFS ( Tivo's Media File System ): especially for TiVo devices
• Qnx4fs ( QNX 4 File System ): Standard file system from QNX version 4
• Qnx6fs ( QNX 6 File System ): File system in QNX versions from 6.4
• SDFS: Supports multiple operating systems, deduplication, and versioning
• SkyFS ( SkyOS File System ): fork of OpenBFS (see above), standard file system under SkyOS
• VMFS ( Virtual Machine File System ): Standard file system in VMware ESX
• WAFL ( Write Anywhere File Layout ): especially for use on NAS systems from NetApp
• µC / FS a FAT file system especially for embedded systems, from Embedded Office

Flash disk file systems

Due to the special properties of data carriers based on flash memory, there are some file systems that take these properties into account.

• APFS ( Apple File System ): Apple file system that has been optimized from the ground up for flash storage
• ETFS ( Embedded Transactional File System ): File system for NAND Flash, especially under QNX
• exFAT ( Extended File Allocation Table ): a further developed version of Microsoft's FAT32 , included from Windows CE 6 , Vista SP1 and XP SP2
• F2FS ( Flash-Friendly File System ), Samsung's logging file system specially designed for NAND flash drives
• JFFS ( Journaling Flash File System ): Logging file system especially for NOR flash memory ; contrary to its name, it does not use journaling
• JFFS2 ( Journaling Flash File System, Version 2 ): further developed variant of JFFS, support for NAND Flash, compression etc .; contrary to its name, it does not use journaling
• LogFS: Logging file system especially for flash drives, potential JFFS2 successor, still under development
• NVFS ( non-volatile file system ): in Palm - PDAs inserted file system for persistence of the contents of the volatile memory
• TrueFFS ( True Flash File System ): a file system on a low level (American-English low level ) for solid-state drives from M-Systems
• spiffs (for Serial Peripheral Interface Flash File System ) for serial NOR flash memories with SPI interface.
• ExtremeFFS ( Extreme Flash File System ): a low-level file system for solid state drives from SanDisk ; based on TrueFFS
• UBIFS ( Unsorted Block Image File System ): potential JFFS2 successor promoted by Nokia
• YAFFS ( Yet Another Flash File System ): specifically for NAND flash memory
• JesFS (Jo's embedded FileSystem): A robust file system especially for small microcontrollers (16/32 bit) and serial NOR flash memories up to 2GByte. Published under GPL v3.

File systems for CD-ROM / DVD-ROM

• ISO 9660 (also CDFS, Compact Disc File System ): Standard file system for CD-ROMs
• Joliet : Extension of the ISO9660 format for longer file names with Unicode characters , from Microsoft
• Romeo : Extension of the ISO9660 format for longer file names without Unicode characters, by Adaptec
• Rockridge : Extension of the ISO9660 format for UNIX-like operating systems with file rights etc.
• UDF ( Universal Disk Format ): Standard file system for DVDs and Blu-ray Discs

File systems for floppy disks

see diskette # Usable file systems (examples)

Network and cluster file systems

Especially in the field of professional file management, one often strives for distributed storage systems, organized centrally or decentrally depending on the requirements. For these, special file systems are usually required in order to be able to handle the access of several participants over the network to data safely and transparently.

• AFS ( Andrew File System ): Network file system for larger scales, with its own rights management (not to be confused with Acer Fast File System )
• Apple Filing Protocol : Network file system primarily for Mac OS systems
• BeeGFS : (formerly FhGFS) parallel network file system for performance-critical applications
• Ceph : Distributed file system, offers object, block, and file storage
• CIFS ( Common Internet File System ): Another name for SMB
• Coda : an advanced network file system similar to NFS
• CFS ( Cryptographic File System ): an encrypted file system based on an NFS daemon
• DCE / DFS ( Distributed Computing Environment Distributed File System ): a further development of the Andrew File System , from the Open Group
• CXFS ( Clustered XFS ): Asymmetrically distributed file system from SGI
• DFS ( Distributed File System ): distributed file system for Microsoft Windows systems (not to be confused with Acorn DFS)
• EMC Celerra HighRoad: asymmetrically distributed file system based on NFS, from EMC
• GFS ( Global File System ): Cluster file system from Red Hat , optionally symmetrical or asymmetrical
• GlusterFS : free cluster file system via FUSE , for HA and HPC environments
• GPFS ( General Parallel File System ): Cluster file system for Linux and AIX systems
• HAMMER : highly available cluster file system for DragonFly BSD
• HP CFS ( Hewlett-Packard Cluster File System ): Cluster file system for Tru64 UNIX, from HP
• LizardFS : fault-tolerant, distributed open source file system for Unix systems that also supports Windows clients (MooseFS Fork)
• Luster : object-based cluster file system for Linux
• Melio FS ( Melio File System ): symmetrically distributed file system for Windows, by Sanbolic
• Moose File System : fault tolerant, distributed file system for Unix systems
• Nasan File System or SAN-FS: asymmetrically distributed network file system, from DataPlow
• NFS ( Network File System ): Sun Microsystems network file system
• OCFS2 ( Oracle Cluster File System, Version 2 ): symmetrically distributed, POSIX-compatible cluster file system, by Oracle for Linux
• PSFS ( PolyServe File System ): symmetrically distributed network file system for PolyServe Matrix Server, by PolyServe
• PStorage ( Parallels Cloud Storage ): fault-tolerant, high-availability file system with SSD caching specialized in virtualized environments, from Parallels
• QFS ( Quick File System ): Asymmetrically distributed network file system for Solaris, by Sun Microsystems
• SMB ( Server Message Block ): network protocol that may A. Provides a network file system, especially for Windows systems
• SSHFS ( Secure Shell Filesystem ): uses SFTP to mount a file system accessible via SSH
• StorNext File System: Asymmetrically distributed network file system, from Quantum
• Veritas Storage Foundation Cluster File System: asymmetrically distributed cluster file system, from Symantec
• xFS ( x File System ): Network file system , developed at Berkeley University (not to be confused with XFS)
• Xsan : Asymmetrically distributed cluster file system for macOS that can interoperate with the StorNext File System , from Apple
• XtreemFS: distributed file system for WANs , for XtreemOS or Linux and also for Windows computers (XP, Vista) but only clients
• Quobyte: scalable, fault-tolerant software storage solution based on a distributed file system

Specialized file systems

• CoreFSIF: Encrypting file system container format for embedded systems , by Avanticore
• CramFS ( Compressed ROM filesystem ): Compressed read-only file system for embedded systems and installation media
• SquashFS : compressed read-only file system

File system concepts

The following file systems are not strictly speaking, but rather concepts that affect file management in a particular way.

• auf (Another UnionFS): Meta-file system that overlays several file systems
• FUSE (Filesystem In Userspace): file system framework to operate file system drivers in user land
• IFS (installable file system): File system framework for Windows 95 and OS / 2
• LUFS (Linux Userland File System): obsolete forerunner of FUSE
• OverlayFS : Meta file system that overlays several file systems
• UnionFS : Meta file system that overlays several file systems
• VFS (virtual file system): abstraction layer above specific file systems

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Technical Note TN1150: HFS Plus Volume Format
2. ↑ Heise.de: Windows 8 gets a new file system
3. ↑ Lessfs: Homepage of the project ( Memento of the original from July 24, 2010 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. 
4. ↑ Jo's Embedded Serial File System (for Standard Serial NOR-Flash) .