# Support for ext4 in SLES ? **URL:** \ **Category:** SLES Configure-Administer\ **Created:** [October 14, 2011, 11:06am UTC](https://forums.suse.com/t/support-for-ext4-in-sles/21836 "2011-10-14T11:06:02Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 4\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![System1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/51bf81/32.png) [@System1](https://forums.suse.com/u/System1)\ **Post date:** [October 14, 2011, 11:06am UTC](https://forums.suse.com/t/support-for-ext4-in-sles/21836/1 "2011-10-14T11:06:02Z")
Does anyone know if ext4 will be officially supported in SLES 11 SP2 ? It would be a nice intermediate upgrade before jumping to btrfs which I believe is still too untested for my production environments. XFS is also nice but it still has the problem that you cannot shrink it. ## – smwit smwit’s Profile: [http://forums.novell.com/member.php?userid=46280](http://forums.novell.com/member.php?userid=46280) View this thread: [http://forums.novell.com/showthread.php?t=446833](http://forums.novell.com/showthread.php?t=446833) ---
**Author:** ![system](https://us1.discourse-cdn.com/flex022/uploads/suse/original/2X/5/5012ba89e3ffb5220dac47d5ea0ba032e2fe1cb6.png) [@system](https://forums.suse.com/u/system)\ **Post date:** [October 14, 2011, 12:16pm UTC](https://forums.suse.com/t/support-for-ext4-in-sles/21836/2 "2011-10-14T12:16:02Z")
The most recent edition of SUSE Geeko Gazette which turned up in my inbox the other day says:[color=blue] > SUSE included btrfs as a technical preview in SUSE Linux Enterprise > Server 11 SP1 and we will fully support it in the upcoming release of > SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 11 SP2.[/color] > There’s no mention of ext4. I was planning to switch my SLED machines > to ext4 assuming it is supported in SP2 but given that btrfs is going to > be supported I’m thinking I’ll switch to that. ## – mikewillis mikewillis’s Profile: [http://forums.novell.com/member.php?userid=7510](http://forums.novell.com/member.php?userid=7510) View this thread: [http://forums.novell.com/showthread.php?t=446833](http://forums.novell.com/showthread.php?t=446833) ---
**Author:** ![system](https://us1.discourse-cdn.com/flex022/uploads/suse/original/2X/5/5012ba89e3ffb5220dac47d5ea0ba032e2fe1cb6.png) [@system](https://forums.suse.com/u/system)\ **Post date:** [October 14, 2011, 3:46pm UTC](https://forums.suse.com/t/support-for-ext4-in-sles/21836/3 "2011-10-14T15:46:02Z")
mikewillis;2146204 Wrote:[color=blue] > The most recent edition of SUSE Geeko Gazette which turned up in my > inbox the other day says: > > There’s no mention of ext4. I was planning to switch my SLED machines > to ext4 assuming it is supported in SP2 but given that btrfs is going to > be supported I’m thinking I’ll switch to that.[/color] Interesting, I would have thought that it was considerably less risky and easier for Novell to support ext4 than btrfs. I would like to have ext4 to cut down the fsck times after crashes, I have som fairly large ext3 filesystems today that take a long time to fsck. Converting to XFS is messy, and it will not let me shrink the filesystem if I want to. Lets pray that btrfs proves stable when Novell releases it, if they decide to not support ext4. ## – smwit smwit’s Profile: [http://forums.novell.com/member.php?userid=46280](http://forums.novell.com/member.php?userid=46280) View this thread: [http://forums.novell.com/showthread.php?t=446833](http://forums.novell.com/showthread.php?t=446833) ---
**Author:** ![system](https://us1.discourse-cdn.com/flex022/uploads/suse/original/2X/5/5012ba89e3ffb5220dac47d5ea0ba032e2fe1cb6.png) [@system](https://forums.suse.com/u/system)\ **Post date:** [October 14, 2011, 7:06pm UTC](https://forums.suse.com/t/support-for-ext4-in-sles/21836/4 "2011-10-14T19:06:01Z")
smwit;2146235 Wrote:[color=blue] > I would like to have ext4 to cut down the fsck times after crashes,[/color] > I want(ed) ext4 to cut down on the time I have to wait for those > periodic fsck checks on boot that are inflicted upon users by default. > Very tedious, even if it’s just checking a (mostly full) 20GB > partition. smwit;2146235 Wrote:[color=blue] > Lets pray that btrfs proves stable when Novell releases it, if they > decide to not support ext4.[/color] > Given that Novell have gone to the effort of making specific mention of > btrfs support in advance of the SP2 release, one has to assume that they > consider it to be stable and suitable production use. The newsletter > doesn’t indicate which filesystem the SP2 installer defaults to though, > which would be interesting to know. You can read the newsletter online ‘SUSE Geeko Gazette’ ([http://www.suse.com/company/newsletter/suse-geeko-gazette-oct2011\_1.html](http://www.suse.com/company/newsletter/suse-geeko-gazette-oct2011_1.html)) ## – mikewillis mikewillis’s Profile: [http://forums.novell.com/member.php?userid=7510](http://forums.novell.com/member.php?userid=7510) View this thread: [http://forums.novell.com/showthread.php?t=446833](http://forums.novell.com/showthread.php?t=446833)