Creating a Basic ZFS File System

ZFS administration has been designed with simplicity in mind. Among the design goals is to reduce the number of commands needed to create a usable file system. For example, when you create a new pool, a new ZFS file system is created and mounted automatically.

The following example shows how to create a basic mirrored storage pool named tank and a ZFS file system named tank in one command. Assume that the whole disks /dev/dsk/c1t0d0 and /dev/dsk/c2t0d0 are available for use.

# zpool create tank mirror c1t0d0 c2t0d0

For more information about redundant ZFS pool configurations, see Replication Features of a ZFS Storage Pool.

The new ZFS file system, tank, can use available disk space as needed, and is automatically mounted at /tank.

# mkfile 100m /tank/foo
# df -h /tank
Filesystem             size   used  avail capacity  Mounted on
tank                   80G   100M    80G     1%    /tank

Within a pool, you probably want to create additional file systems. File systems provide points of administration that enable you to manage different sets of data within the same pool.

The following example shows how to create a file system named fs in the storage pool tank.

# zfs create tank/fs

The new ZFS file system, tank/fs, can use available disk space as needed, and is automatically mounted at /tank/fs.

# mkfile 100m /tank/fs/foo
# df -h /tank/fs
Filesystem             size   used  avail capacity  Mounted on
tank/fs                 80G   100M    80G     1%    /tank/fs

Typically, you want to create and organize a hierarchy of file systems that matches your organizational needs. For information about creating a hierarchy of ZFS file systems, see Creating a ZFS File System Hierarchy.