AlmaLinux gives Btrfs a home after Red Hat kicked it out

Not the default file system, but in the installer if you want it

AlmaLinux is to support the Btrfs file system in version 10.1 of its eponymous RHELative operating system.

While Red Hat deprecated Btrfs from Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) in 2017, the technology has found favor elsewhere. It can be found in SUSE, for example, and was recently an indirect participant in yet another Linux drama.

Although Red Hat might not be keen on Btrfs, which was originally developed at Oracle to harden Linux's storage capabilities, AlmaLinux has embraced the technology and has now released the beta of version 10.1.

"Btrfs is a modern Copy-on-Write (CoW) file system implementing advanced features while also focusing on fault tolerance, repair and easy administration. Among other things, it provides snapshotting, built-in volume management, checksumming for data and metadata, transparent compression and efficient copying via reflinks," wrote Davide Cavalca, a production engineer for the Linux userspace at Meta.

"It is now possible to install AlmaLinux OS with a Btrfs file system from the very beginning," he wrote. "Initial enablement was scoped to the installer and storage management stack, and broader support within the AlmaLinux software collection for Btrfs features is forthcoming."

Right now, this means that when installing AlmaLinux OS 10.1 or (AlmaLinux OS Kitten, the organization's not-for-production preview OS), it's now possible to install the OS to a Btrfs volume instead of the default XFS+LVM configuration.

"These features lead to better performance for most common workloads and stronger resistance against bitrot and other potential issues with the underlying storage medium."

However, as observed during the bcachefs spat, Btrfs also has its detractors: "People don't trust it, and for good reason," one wrote.

Indeed, one Register writer encountered several difficulties with the technology while prodding at OpenSUSE, where it is the default file system.

That said, Btrfs support could be seen as giving AlmaLinux a competitive edge against RHEL and other rivals that continue to steer clear. However, it is also evidence of growing fragmentation in the enterprise Linux market that began when Red Hat, an IBM subsidiary, elected to kill off the CentOS Linux project in favor of CentOS Stream (a development branch of RHEL) and made RHEL source code harder to access.

The result was a list of alternatives, including AlmaLinux, Rocky Linux, and Oracle Linux. AlmaLinux claims to be binary compatible with RHEL.

However one feels about Btrfs, its inclusion is a sign of a widening gap between the distributions. ®