Windows Storage Server 2008R2 - NFS Concerns

Many of you may have the pleasure of working on a Windows Storage Server (WSS) 2008R2 platform.  Typically the company you purchase this from will sell this to you as an OEM'd appliance.  As a result one of the largest niches that I see this used in is for NFS shares.

Well the ability to share a typical Windows based file with a Linux box at this time seems easy enough there are a few drawbacks and concerns.

Perhaps the single BEST reference will be that from here.

However it will require that you understand the UNIX User Mapping services.  A good article would be :http://support.microsoft.com/kb/324073/EN-US

But even if all of this is properly established and the share is created there are still limits.  Many of which when found are causing data corruption.  This is simply due to the fact that the UNIX system does not have a limit on the number of files and handles the share completely differently.

Windows by default will attempt to load a small portion of the files in the share into physical memory.  When this is overwhelmed then the virtual memory.  Anything that gets out of sequence (which UNIX loves!) then will be seen as corruption. 

What to do?

 I think I have a decent work around for this - iSCSI Targeting Software.  It may not be the best for every environment but it will be secure and work well.

First this is a FREE download and completely supported for and by many OEM'd WSS 2008R2.  Please double-check with your vendor.

Next, use one of the free NICs on your appliance.  Give it a dedicated non-routable IP and ensure that you VLAN this in the switch to keep this as isolated as possible.  This traffic can be a bit more robust so keep it isolated will ensure that it does not bring down the network already established.

Now create the VHD file to be used and presented as a BLOCK LEVEL device to the Linux host attaching.  Setup the access list for the server attaching. 

This will allow the Linux/UNIX host to have and control the VHD.  It can create its own file system on this and function normally.  This also allows the Windows host to now create snapshots that backup solutions can help and use.