Apple no longer pursuing ZFS as the next generation file system for OS X

Seth Weintraub
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October 23, 2009
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Today, the ZFS repository on MacOSforge was closed, likely meaning the end of Apple's pursuit of Sun's next generation file storage system for use in Mac and Macintosh OSX Server.  They also mention that the mailing list and repository are also being removed.

As John Gruber points out, the writing has been on the wall for awhile as 10.6 betas had some support for the file system but the final releases (Client and Server) had it wiped from existence.

While it is now unlikely that Apple will ever use ZFS as a mainstream file system, it is possible that Apple could support it as a third party file system, like it does with SMB or NFS formats.  Gruber mentions that this decision was more of a legal one than a technical one.  Perhaps Sun's new owner, Oracle (not a big open source player), wants to keep the technology in-house.  He also mentioned that Apple is hiring internal file systems engineers, meaning they are going to build their own next-gen file system.

 

Comments (10)

Adi (not verified) | October 23, 2009 - 12:56pm

This blows. Apple is in dire need of a new file system and ZFS has no equal.

I guess there's always BTRFS... but that's GPL so i'm not sure how comfortable Apple will be with that.

Adi

ramb (not verified) | October 23, 2009 - 1:51pm

Seriously, it's embarrassing that a Mac news site of all websites would spell "Mac OS X" as "Mac OSX." It's very annoying as well. Keep a space between "OS" and "X."

Raj (not verified) | October 23, 2009 - 2:34pm

I was truly hoping that Apple could push ZFS mainstream.

Maybe it just wasn't meant to be (there are still some non-trivial ZFS issues that need to be ironed out and make it less stable than HFS+ despite it's awesome features)

9to5Mac Noob (not verified) | October 23, 2009 - 2:38pm

how is that annoying? you are just being OCD

9to5Mac Noob (not verified) | October 23, 2009 - 5:47pm

This is exactly why patents are bad!

Now Apple has to re-invent the wheel just because they can't use ZFS...
Certain basic things which would benefit everyone should just not be patentable.
File formats and file systems are two of them.

wtf (not verified) | October 23, 2009 - 9:24pm

>not a big open source player

er, what? Note btrfs, a gpl compatible high performance file system, is one of their core projects.

http://oss.oracle.com/projects/

what useful things has Apple contributed upstream recently? Clang and allowing 3rd party implementations of GCD. As of right now, a file system to replace UFS, HFS+, and EXT* would be much more useful.

MadDog (not verified) | October 23, 2009 - 11:17pm

...WebKit? Seems pretty popular...

9to5Mac Noob (not verified) | October 23, 2009 - 10:37pm

"Apple could support it as a third party file system, like it does with Super Mario Brothers or Need For Speed formats."

MadDog (not verified) | October 23, 2009 - 11:28pm

but if you follow the link Gruber gives to details on the NetApp case, Sun were still crowing about how they were confident of still winning the case up until July this year, and the final update seems to imply that all of NetApps claims were dismissed either by the court or through re-examination by the PTO.
Perhaps someone with an actual legal background could confirm, but the wording is very much consistent with a win for Sun. Is this, in fact, what happened?

Also, aren't Jobs and Ellison meant to be best buddies or something? How would that translate into "distrust/dislike for Oracle"?

9to5Mac Noob (not verified) | October 25, 2009 - 2:19pm

apple and performance rarely go together
apple and choice rarely go together

good fit