Managing FileSystems

Logging In to the Management Console of the Appliance

Use the management console of the appliance to create, manage, and monitor filesystems.

To access the management console:

Using your web browser, go to the following URL:
https://appliance_ip

Here, appliance_ip is the public IP address of the appliance instance. See Finding Out the IP Addresses of the Appliance Instance.

Note:
Your browser may display a warning that the SSL certificate couldn’t be verified. This warning is displayed because Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Storage Software Appliance uses a self-signed certificate for the HTTPS connection. If you’ve entered the correct public IP address of the appliance instance in the browser address bar, then you can safely ignore this warning. The steps to ignore this warning and proceed to the management console vary depending on the browser you use. For example, in Mozilla Firefox v38.4, you can proceed by clicking Add Exception on the This Connection is Untrusted page. In Google Chrome v46.0, click Advanced on the Your connection is not private page.

The login page is displayed.
Enter the password for the admin user.

Note:
If you’re logging in to the management console of the appliance for the first time, you’ll be prompted to set and confirm the password for the admin user of Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Storage Software Appliance.
The password can contain from 8 to 32 characters, with at least one special character, one numerical character, one uppercase character, and one lowercase character.

Tip:
Remember the password. You must enter it every time you access the management console of Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Storage Software Appliance.
If you don’t remember the password, you can reset it. See Changing the Admin Password for the Appliance.

Creating Your First Filesystem

A FileSystem in Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Storage Software Appliance connects a directory on the Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Compute Classic instance that hosts the appliance to a container on the storage service.

Note:

If you’ve already created the first filesystem and now want to create additional filesystems, then see Adding a FileSystem.

Before You Begin

Keep the following information ready:
- The object storage API endpoint for the storage account to which you want to connect the filesystem.
  Note:
  - To find the object storage API endpoint for your Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Object Storage Classic account, go to the Oracle Cloud My Services page and look for the REST Endpoint field under the Additional Information section. (Not available on Oracle Cloud at Customer)
- The log in credentials for your storage account.
  
  The account-creation email from Oracle would contain this information.
  
  Note:
  The user must have the Storage Administrator role. If the user doesn’t have the required role or you aren’t sure, then ask your service administrator to ensure that the user has the required role in Oracle Cloud My Services. See Managing User Roles in Managing and Monitoring Oracle Cloud.
Ensure that a replication policy has been set. See Selecting a Replication Policy in Using Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Object Storage Classic. (Not available on Oracle Cloud at Customer)

Steps

Access the management console of the appliance:

Using your web browser, go to the following URL:

https://appliance_ip

Here, appliance_ip is the public IP address of the appliance instance. See Finding Out the IP Addresses of the Appliance Instance.
You’re prompted to set the password for the admin user of the appliance.

Enter a password that complies with the password rules displayed on the page, and click Save.

Remember the password. You must enter it every time you access the management console of Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Storage Software Appliance.

The login page is displayed.
Enter the password for the admin user, and click Log In.

A wizard to create the first filesystem starts.
Enter a name for the filesystem, and click Next.

Note:

For the character restrictions applicable in Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Object Storage Classic when you must select a file name or a filesystem name, see Character Restrictions.
Enter the object storage API endpoint of your storage account, and click Next.
Create a filesystem using your Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Object Storage Classic account details:
- User name of your account (for example: jack.jones@example.com).
- Password of your account.
- Click Validate.
Set the following options as required:
- Enable Encryption: If you would like to enable encryption of data in the filesystem before it is uploaded to Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Object Storage Classic, then select this check box. You can provide the encryption keys later.
  
  Note:
  You can enable encryption for a filesystem only at the time of creating the filesystem, not later.
- Enable Archive (Not available on Oracle Cloud at Customer): Select this check box if you want to connect this filesystem to a container of the Archive storage class.
  For more information, see About Archive FileSystems.
Click Show Advanced, and enter the required information in the advanced configuration fields. For more information, see the Table 6-* in Adding a FileSystem.
Click Save.
The filesystem is created and the details of the filesystem are displayed on the Dashboard page.

The filesystem that you just created is mounted on the appliance instance on a directory named /mnt/gateway/filesystem_name_that_you_specified.

Next Tasks:

If you enabled encryption for the filesystem, then provide the encryption keys. See Encrypting Data for a FileSystem.
Connect the filesystem that you just created to a container in your storage service instance in the cloud. See Connecting a FileSystem.
Mount the filesystem on the client instances. See Mounting Appliance FileSystems on Client Instances.

Note:
If required, you can create additional filesystems and mount them (see Adding a FileSystem).

About Archive FileSystems

This topic does not apply to Oracle Cloud at Customer.

When you create a filesystem of the Archive storage class, if a container by the same name doesn’t exist in your account, then the container will be created. In addition, another container named filesystem_name-archive is created.

For example, if you create a filesystem with the name myFirstArchiveFS of the Archive storage class, then the following two containers are created:

myFirstArchiveFS-archive
This container is of the Archive storage class. All the files that are uploaded in the mounted directory on the NFS client are stored in the myFirstArchiveFS filesystem on the appliance host and then asynchronously copied to this container. Metadata backups are also stored in this container.
myFirstArchiveFS
Metadata synchronization objects are stored in this container. Metadata synchronization objects enable metadata information to be restored if the appliance installation is lost.

In addition to metadata synchronization objects, the metadata backups are stored in an Archive container periodically.

If the filesystem name matches an existing container, and if the container is of the Standard storage class, then you cannot mount the filesystem and an error message is displayed.

The appliance automatically performs daily, weekly, and monthly metadata backups.

Adding a FileSystem

You can add one or more filesystems in Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Storage Software Appliance and connect each filesystem to a container in your account.

Log in to the management console.
See Logging In to the Management Console of the Appliance.

The available filesystems are displayed.
Click Create Filesystem in the navigation pane on the left.
The Create a FileSystem page is displayed.

Enter the required information in the following fields:

Field	Description
FileSystem Name	Name of the filesystem. If a container by the same name doesn’t exist in your account, then it will be created. Enter a name that is meaningful to you and unique. Note: For the character restrictions applicable when you enter a filesystem name, see Character Restrictions. If a container with the same name as the filesystem already exists, and if that container isn’t empty, then the data cached in the Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Storage Software Appliance filesystem may not be consistent with data stored in the container.
Object Storage API Endpoint	The object storage API endpoint for your service instance. To find out the object storage API endpoint for your Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Object Storage Classic instance, see About REST URLs for Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Object Storage Classic Resources in Using Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Object Storage Classic. (Not available on Oracle Cloud at Customer) Go to Step 4a.
User Name	Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Object Storage Classic user name.
Account Password	Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Object Storage Classic password.

1. Click Validate.
  If any of the values entered above do not match your Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Object Storage Classic account credentials, then an error message is displayed. Recheck and enter the appropriate values in the respective fields.
2. Click Save.
If you would like to enable encryption of data in the filesystem before it is uploaded to your account, then select the Enable Encryption check box. You can provide the encryption keys later. For more information, see Encrypting Data for a FileSystem.

Note:
You can enable encryption for a filesystem only at the time of adding the filesystem, not later.

Caution:
Ensure that you enable encryption in the new appliance filesystem when you claim ownership from another appliance filesystem (if encryption was enabled in the other appliance filesystem). Otherwise, the data uploaded from the new appliance filesystem may cause inconsistency in the container, as the container may contain encrypted data from the previous appliance filesystem.
If a filesystem is deleted in the appliance, ensure that you enable encryption in the re-created filesystem.
If you want to create an Archive filesystem, then select the Enable Archive check box. (Not available on Oracle Cloud at Customer)

For more information, see About Archive FileSystems .

If the filesystem name matches an existing container, and if the storage class of the container is standard, then you cannot mount the filesystem and an error message is displayed.

Click Show Advanced, and enter the required information in the following fields:

Field	Description
NFS Allowed Hosts	The hosts allowed to connect to the NFS export. Example: `2001:db8:9:e54::/64`, `192.0.2.0/24`
NFS Export Options	The NFS export options. Example: `rw`, `sync`, `insecure`, `no_subtree_check`, `no_root_squash` Don’t specify the `fsid` option.
Maximum Local Cache Size in GiB	The maximum number of bytes that can be cached. When the data in the cache reaches the specified limit or the cache is full, the appliance removes files from the cache based on a least recently used (LRU) algorithm. The files that are yet to be uploaded to the account are not removed from the cache. The preserved files (by cache pinning) are also not removed from the cache. See Configuring the Cache for FileSystems. Note: The number of files in cache is limited to 20,000, regardless of the specified cache size in bytes.
Concurrent Uploads	The number of concurrent uploads to the cloud. Allowed range: 1 to 30 This field indicates the maximum number of files that can be concurrently uploaded in the appliance. If the value is 5, the concurrent file uploads can be between 0-5.
Delete Old File Versions	If you select this check box for a filesystem, then every time you start the appliance and once every 24 hours after that, all the older versions of all the objects are deleted in the container that's connected to the filesystem. Only the latest version of each object is retained. For more information, see Enabling File Versions Compaction. This option is disabled by default.
Restore Object Retention	The number of days a file will remain in the restored state. Note: This field is displayed only for an `archive` filesystems. Default value: 10
Sync Policy	The metadata operations are flushed to the disk based on the following modes. Select one of the following modes based on your requirement: Asynchronous In this mode, the filesystem operations are time-based and are persisted asynchronously. This mode offers the best performance. Note: This mode is not suitable for any filesystem operation that depends on synchronous transactions. Posix Standard This mode is enabled by default. Only the synchronous transactions (like fsync, ODSYNC and OSYNC) are committed to the disk. All the other transactions are handled asynchronously. These sync modes do not affect on-disk consistency.
Cloud Read-ahead	The number of 1-MB blocks to be downloaded and used to read ahead when reading files. Use this setting to improve the read performance for large files that aren't cached. Default value: 0 (prefetching is disabled)

Click Save.

Next Task

Connect the filesystem. See Connecting a FileSystem.

Importing an Existing Filesystem

Prerequisite

Before you import an existing filesystem from another appliance, ensure that all the pending uploads of the files residing on the appliance which last owned the filesystem, are completed and the files are uploaded to your account.

Note:

There may be pending or interrupted file uploads in a failed appliance. If you’re importing an existing filesystem from a failed appliance, you must re-create those files in the filesystem on the recovery appliance.

Log in to the management console.
See Logging In to the Management Console of the Appliance.

The available filesystems are displayed.
Click Create FileSystem in the navigation pane on the left.
The Create a FileSystem page is displayed.
Enter the required information in the Required tab.
For the filesystem name, enter the name of the existing filesystem that you want to import to this appliance.
Click Validate.
If any of the values entered do not match your Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Object Storage Classic account credentials, then an error message is displayed. Recheck and enter the appropriate values in the respective fields.
Select the options that you’d like to enable in the filesystem.
For example: Enable Encryption.
Click Show Advanced, and enter the required information.
Click Save.
The filesystem is created and displayed on the Dashboard tab.
Click Connect for the filesystem that you want to import.
If the filesystem that you're importing is connected to another appliance, then FileSystem: Claim Ownership window is displayed, prompting you to confirm whether the other appliance must be disconnected.

If you opt to proceed, then re-enter your Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Object Storage Classic password and select Claim Ownership.

A filesystem may be mounted for read/write on only one appliance at a time.

If a container with the same name as the filesystem exists in your Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Object Storage Classic account, then the filesystem is connected to that container. If a container by that name doesn’t exist, then it’s created and the filesystem is connected to the container.

Next Task: Mount the filesystem on the required client instances. See Mounting Appliance FileSystems on Client Instances.

Configuring the Cache for FileSystems

Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Storage Software Appliance caches frequently retrieved data on the local host, minimizing the number of REST API calls to your service instance and enabling faster data retrieval. The appliance uses an upload buffer and a read cache for data storage and retrieval.

Note:

The cache resides on the data disks attached to the appliance instance. At any time, you can increase the disk space available for caching by adding disks. See Adding Data Disks to the Appliance Instance.

Topics

About the FileSystem Cache

The filesystem cache serves two roles: an upload buffer and a read cache. The upload buffer contains data that has been copied to the disk cache and is queued to be stored in your account. The read cache contains frequently retrieved data that’s accessible locally for read operations.

When an application transfers a file through an NFS share, the file is queued to be stored in your account. The upload buffer might contain many files. If the host on which Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Storage Software Appliance is installed fails, or if the appliance stops abruptly, the pending upload operations are not lost because they are persisted on the local disk. When the appliance restarts, the pending upload operations resume and the data is stored in your account.

When you retrieve data, the data is stored in the read cache of the appliance. This allows subsequent I/O operations to that file to be done at local disk speed.

When the data in the cache reaches the specified limit or the cache is full, the appliance removes files from the cache based on a least recently used (LRU) algorithm. The files that are yet to be uploaded to the account are not removed from the cache. The preserved files (by cache pinning) are also not removed from the cache.

Guidelines for Sizing and Configuring the Cache

See Best Practices – Configuring Cache Storage and Best Practices – Determining the Cache Size.

Configuring the FileSystem Cache

You can configure the cache for a filesystem while adding the filesystem. See Adding a FileSystem.

Encrypting Data for a FileSystem

To ensure that your data remains protected both when it’s stored in your service instance and while in transit, you can enable encryption of the data in Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Storage Software Appliance before it’s stored in your service instance.

Topics

About FileSystem Encryption

Data encryption in Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Storage Software Appliance is done using a symmetric key, which is stored in a database on the appliance and is encrypted by using an asymmetric public-private key pair. Administrators can back up and store the asymmetric keys, and use them to recover encrypted data.

When a file is stored in Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Storage Software Appliance, it’s first stored in the appliance cache in its original form. The file is encrypted before it’s uploaded to your account. When a file is retrieved from your account, the data is decrypted while it’s streamed to the appliance cache.

Enabling Encryption for a FileSystem

To enable encryption for a filesystem, you must select the Enable Encryption check box when you create the filesystem. See Adding a FileSystem.

Note:

You can enable encryption on a filesystem only when the filesystem is created and before it’s connected to your account. You can’t enable or disable encryption after a filesystem is created and connected.

The following message is displayed in the management console after you enable encryption for a filesystem:

Encryption is enabled

After enabling encryption for a filesystem, you can generate encryption keys and specify the keys in the management console. When required, you can change the encryption keys.

Generating Encryption Keys

Log in to any UNIX-like host that has the OpenSSL toolkit installed on it. See https://www.openssl.org/.
Generate an RSA private key:
openssl genrsa -out mykey.pem 2048
Convert the RSA private key to the pk8 format:
openssl pkcs8 -in mykey.pem -out privateKey.key -outform pem -nocrypt -topk8
Generate the public key for the private key:
openssl rsa -in privateKey.key -out publicKey.key -pubout -outform pem

Note:

Ensure that the encryption keys are backed up and saved on another host.

Specifying the Encryption Keys for a FileSystem

Log in to the management console.
See Logging In to the Management Console of the Appliance.
Select the filesystem for which you want to specify encryption keys, and go to the Encryption Keys tab.
Copy the private key that you generated earlier, and paste it in the Private Key field in the Set New Encryption Keys section.
Copy the corresponding public key and paste it in the Public Key field in the Set New Encryption Keys section.
Click Save New Keys.

Retrieving the Encryption Keys of a FileSystem

Log in to the management console.
See Logging In to the Management Console of the Appliance.
Select the filesystem for which you want to download encryption keys, and go to the Encryption Keys tab.
Click Download in the Existing Encryption Keys section.
Save the .tar.gz file (that contains the encryption keys) in a location of your choice.

Connecting a FileSystem

After you create a filesystem, you must connect it to a container in your account before you can store and retrieve data through the filesystem.

Note:

During the appliance provisioning process, if you had opted to create the first filesystem by using the provisioning script, then that filesystem would have been connected automatically to your account. The steps described in this section aren’t relevant to that filesystem.

Caution:

If a container with the same name as the filesystem already exists, and if that container isn’t empty, then the data cached in the Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Storage Software Appliance filesystem may not be consistent with data stored in the container.

Log in to the management console of Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Storage Software Appliance.
See Logging In to the Management Console of the Appliance.
On the Dashboard tab, identify the filesystem that you want to connect to your account.
Click Connect.
If a container with the same name as the filesystem exists in Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Object Storage Classic, then the filesystem is connected to that container. If a container by that name doesn’t exist, then it’s created and the filesystem is connected to the container.
Note:

A filesystem may be mounted for read/write on only one appliance at a time.
- If the filesystem name that you've specified matches the name of an existing container in your Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Object Storage Classic account, and if that container is connected to another appliance filesystem, then FileSystem: Claim Ownership window is displayed, prompting you to confirm whether the other filesystem must be disconnected. If you opt to proceed, then you must re-enter your Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Object Storage Classic password and select Claim Ownership.
This check ensures that you don't inadvertently connect the new filesystem to a container that's already connected to another appliance filesystem.

Next Task: Mount the filesystem on the required client instances. See Mounting Appliance FileSystems on Client Instances.

Disconnecting a FileSystem

To disconnect a filesystem, select it on the dashboard of the Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Storage Software Appliance management console, and click Disconnect.

The container to which the filesystem was previously connected and the stored data remain intact even after the filesystem is disconnected.

At any time, you can resume storing and retrieving data through the filesystem by connecting it again. If you no longer need the disconnected filesystem, then you can delete it. See Deleting a FileSystem.

Mounting Appliance FileSystems on Client Instances

Each filesystem in Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Storage Software Appliance maps a directory on the appliance host to a container in your storage service instance in the cloud. To enable your client Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Compute Classic instances to access shared storage through the appliance, you must mount the appliance filesystems on the client Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Compute Classic instances.

Supported NFS Clients

Oracle Linux 6.4, 6.6, and 7.3
Ubuntu 14.04 and 16.04
CentOS 7
Debian 8 Jessie

Before You Begin

Note the names of the filesystems that you want to mount.

The appliance management console displays a list of all the available filesystems. See Logging In to the Management Console of the Appliance.
Make sure that the filesystems that you want to mount are connected to your storage service instance in the cloud. See Connecting a FileSystem.
Find out the private IP address of the Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Compute Classic instance on which Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Storage Software Appliance is provisioned. See Finding Out the IP Addresses of the Appliance Instance.
Identify the Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Compute Classic instances (clients) for which you want to provide shared storage, and note the public IP addresses of those instances.

You can find out the public IP address of an instance by viewing its details in the Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Compute Classic web console. See Monitoring Instances in Using Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Compute Classic.

Steps

Complete the following steps on each Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Compute Classic instance for which you want to provide shared storage.

Log in to the instance using ssh.

See Accessing an Instance Using SSH in Using Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Compute Classic.
Create a directory that you’ll use as the mount point, as shown in the following example:

mkdir /mnt/myFileSystem1
Open the /etc/fstab file in a text editor like vi.

Note:
You must be the root user or a user with sudo privileges to be able to edit /etc/fstab.

sudo vi /etc/fstab

Each line in this file defines a local directory on which a particular file system—either local or remote—is mounted.
Add a line to mount your appliance filesystem, in the following format:

remote-filesystem mountpoint type options

Here’s an example:

10.196.35.246:/myFileSystem1 /mnt/myFileSystem1 nfs vers=4

In this example,
- 10.196.35.246 is the private IP address of the appliance instance.
- myFileSystem1 is the filesystem that you want to mount.
- /mnt/myFileSystem1 is the directory (on the client instance) on which you want to mount the filesystem.
- nfs indicates that this mount should use the NFS protocol.
- vers=4 indicates that the NFS v4 protocol must be used.
  
  Besides vers=4, you can specify additional options separated by commas. See http://linux.die.net/man/5/nfs.
Save and close /etc/fstab.
Activate the new mount by running the mount command, as shown in the following example:

sudo mount /mnt/myFileSystem1

Any files that the applications running on the client Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Compute Classic instance write to /mnt/myFileSystem1 will be cached in the appliance filesystem and uploaded asynchronously to your storage service instance in the cloud.

At any time, you can unmount and mount the filesystem again by using the umount and mount commands, respectively, as shown in the following examples:

umount /mnt/myFileSystem1

mount /mnt/myFileSystem1
Note:
- If you’re facing difficulty in accessing the filesystem from your NFS client, then run the following command to flush the entries from the kernel’s export table:
```
exportfs -f
```
  Fresh entries will be added to the kernel’s export table, when you next mount the filesystems on the NFS client.
- If your client Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Compute Classic instance isn’t set up to boot from a persistent disk, then every time the instance is re-created, you must mount the filesystems again.
  
  If the client instance boots from a persistent disk, then when the instance is re-created, all the mounts defined in /etc/fstab are activated automatically.

Preserving Files in the FileSystem Cache

Note:

Archive support not available on Oracle Cloud at Customer

When you write a file to your filesystem, it’s initially stored in the filesystem cache, and then uploaded to the container on your storage service instance in the cloud. Once a file has been uploaded to a container, it may get removed from the filesystem cache by the cache manager. The cache is reclaimed using the Least Recently Used (LRU) cache management policy to meet the cache threshold that’s specified in the filesystem advanced settings. If you want specific files to be always available in the cache for quick access, you can preserve them in the filesystem cache by pinning them to the cache. Once pinned, the files are not removed from the filesystem cache, except if you specifically unpin them.

You can pin files to the cache for filesystems connected to any storage class, Standard or Archive. Files that you write to a filesystem are uploaded to your storage service instance in the cloud, regardless of whether the files are pinned to the cache.

If the file that you want to pin to the filesystem cache is not present in the cache, then it’s automatically downloaded to the cache from the container on your storage service. If that file belongs to a filesystem of the Archive storage class, then it’s first restored, and then downloaded.

Note:

When selecting the files for cache pinning, consider the overall cache threshold and calculate the residual cache space that would be available for normal cache operations. For example, if your cache threshold is 1 TB, and you estimate files that are pinned to the cache to occupy 300 GB, then you’d have 700 GB usable space on your cache after pinning the files. See Best Practices – Configuring Cache Storage and Best Practices – Determining the Cache Size.
By default, the cache pinning feature is enabled on all filesystems.
When you restore a file that belongs to a filesystem of the Archive storage class, the file will remain in the corresponding container of the Standard storage class for the duration specified in the Restore Object Retention field for any filesystem. Its continued availability in the cache will depend on the LRU operation. However, when you pin such a file to the cache, the restored file will remain in the cache, until if you specifically unpin it.

Enabling and Managing Cache Pinning

To perform cache pinning operations for a filesystem, run the following command from the NFS client on which the filesystem is mounted:

cat /path/to/mountpoint:::cache:cache_command[:argument]

The following table lists the cache pinning operations and the corresponding command and argument for each operation:

Operation	Cache Command	Argument
Enable cache pinning for a filesystem Note that, by default, cache pinning is enabled for all filesystems.	`set-preserve-option`	`true`
Get the cache pinning status for a filesystem	`get-preserve-option`	No argument
Disable cache pinning for a filesystem	`set-preserve-option`	`false`
List the files that are pinned to the cache	`list-preserve`	No argument
Remove any files from the preserve list that have been deleted	`list-preserve-update`	No argument
Add a file to the preserve list	`add-preserve`	No argument
Remove a file from the preserve list	`remove-preserve`	No argument
Clear the preserve list	`clear-preserve`	No argument

Example Commands

To enable cache pinning for the myFS filesystem:

cat /mnt/gateway/myFS/:::cache:set-preserve-option:true

To get the cache pinning status for myFS:
```
cat /mnt/gateway/myFS/:::cache:get-preserve-option
```
The output of this command is true if cache pinning is enabled for the filesystem. Otherwise, false.

To disable cache pinning for the myFS filesystem:

cat /mnt/gateway/myFS/:::cache:set-preserve-option:false

To add a file myFile of the myFS filesystem to the preserve list:
```
cat /mnt/gateway/myFS/myFile:::cache:add-preserve
```
To find out which files are added to the preserve list of the myFS filesystem:
```
cat /mnt/gateway/myFS/:::cache:list-preserve
```
A sample output of the above command:
```
["/doNotDelete.txt", "/myFileMetadata", "/myFile"]
```

To remove the file myFile from the preserve list

cat /mnt/gateway/myFS/myFile:::cache:remove-preserve

To update the preserve list when the output of the cache:list-preserve command indicates that a pinned file has been removed from the filesystem:
```
cat /mnt/gateway/myFS/:::cache:list-preserve-update
```
A sample of the original preserve list:
```
["/doNotDelete.txt", "/myFileMetadata"]
```
Output of the cache:list-preserve command after the file myFileMetadata is removed from the cache:
```
["/doNotDelete.txt", "Status: 1 files appear to no longer exist. Please run list-preserve-update"]
```
Output of the cache:list-preserve-update command:
```
["/doNotDelete.txt"]
```

To clear the preserve list for a filesystem:

cat /mnt/gateway/myFS/:::cache:clear-preserve

Enabling File Versions Compaction

Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Storage Software Appliance allows file operations with byte-level granularity, such as append, re-write, over-write, and truncate. When a file is modified in an appliance filesystem, it results in a new version of the file being created and uploaded to the account.

When you create a filesystem, you can choose whether older versions of an object stored in the cloud must be retained whenever the corresponding file is updated or deleted in the filesystem.

If you select the Delete Old File Versions check box for a filesystem, then a version compaction process runs in the background when you start the appliance. Upon completion of one cycle, the process sleeps for 24 hours before starting the next version compaction cycle. This process removes older versions of all the objects in the container that's connected to the filesystem. Only the latest version of each object is retained.
If you don't select the Delete Old File Versions check box:
- When a file is updated in the filesystem, a new version of the corresponding object in the cloud is created. Additional capacity is consumed in the cloud after each such update operation.
- When a file is deleted in the filesystem, all older versions of the object in the cloud are retained. Capacity continues to be used in the cloud for the file that you deleted in the appliance.

Viewing the Details of a FileSystem

You can view the configuration details of a filesystem and also monitor the upload activity, through the management console of Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Storage Software Appliance.

To view the details of a filesystem, log in to the management console, and click the name of the filesystem:

The Details tab displays the storage service type.
For Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Object Storage Classic accounts, the identity domain associated with your account is also displayed.
For Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Object Storage Classic accounts, you can also view a graphical representation of the amount of cloud storage being used by the filesystem and available free space on the appliance host, with the following details:
- Current Usage
- Free Space
The Settings tab displays the following details:
- Details of the account specified for the filesystem
- Enabled filesystem properties (such as encryption, Archive storage class and deleting old file versions) (Not available on Oracle Cloud at Customer)
- NFS and cache settings for the filesystem
You can edit these settings. If you make any changes, remember to click Save.
The Activity tab shows the ongoing and pending upload activity.
If you contact Oracle Support Services about any issue with the filesystem, you may need to provide the filesystem log to help the Oracle Support Services technician diagnose the issue. To view or download the filesystem log, click View Streaming Logs near the lower-right corner of the Details tab.
The Completed Uploads tab shows the last 100 files that were uploaded to your account during the current browser session. Note that this list doesn’t persist across browser sessions. If you refresh the page or if you open the Completed Uploads tab in another browser after the files are uploaded, then the list will be empty.
You can also disconnect the filesystem. See Connecting a FileSystem.

Next Task

You can edit the properties of a filesystem. See Changing the Properties of a FileSystem.

Changing the Properties of a FileSystem

You can change the properties of a filesystem, through the management console of Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Storage Software Appliance.

Note:

You can't enable or disable encryption, and you can't change the storage class of the filesystem.

To change the properties of a filesystem, log in to the management console, and click the name of the filesystem in the Dashboard pane:

You can edit the filesystem properties and advanced settings (such as the cache limits) of the service instance specified for the filesystem in the Settings tab.

After updating the filesystem properties, click Save.

Note:

For the changes to take effect, you must disconnect and reconnect the filesystem. See Connecting a FileSystem.

Deleting a FileSystem

When you no longer need a filesystem, you can delete it from Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Storage Software Appliance.

To delete a filesystem:

Log in to the management console.
On the Dashboard tab, identify the filesystem that you want to delete.
Make sure that the filesystem is disconnected. If it’s still connected, then click Disconnect.

Note:

The container to which the filesystem was previously connected and the stored data remain intact even after the filesystem is disconnected.
After the filesystem is disconnected, click its name.
On the page that displays the details of the filesystem, click Delete.

The filesystem is deleted from Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Storage Software Appliance. Deleting a filesystem does not automatically delete the objects in the container. If you’d like to remove the objects from the container, all the files should be deleted from the filesystem prior to disconnecting the filesystem, with version compaction enabled.