Differences between GPFS and NTFS

GPFS differs from the Microsoft Windows NT File System (NTFS) in its degree of integration into the Windows administrative environment, Windows Explorer, and the desktop.

The differences are as follows:
  • Manual refreshes are required to see any updates to the GPFS namespace.
  • You cannot use the recycle bin.
  • You cannot use distributed link tracking. This is a technique through which shell shortcuts and OLE links continue to work after the target file is renamed or moved. Distributed link tracking can help you locate the link sources in case the link source is renamed or moved to another folder on the same or different volume on the same computer, or moved to a folder on any computer in the same domain.
  • You cannot use NTFS change journaling. This also means that you cannot use the Microsoft Indexing Service or Windows Search Service to index and search files and folders on GPFS file systems.
GPFS does not support the following NTFS features:
  • File compression (on individual files or on all files within a folder)
  • Encrypted directories
  • Encrypted files (GPFS file encryption is administered through GPFS-specific commands. For more information, see Encryption.)
  • Quota management (GPFS quotas are administered through GPFS-specific commands)
  • Reparse points
  • Defragmentation and error-checking tools
  • Alternate data streams
  • Directory Change Notification
  • The assignment of an access control list (ACL) for the entire drive
  • Any Access Control Entry (ACE) type other than ALLOW, DENY, AUDIT and ALARM.

    Upon an attempt to set any unsupported ACE type (such as OBJECT or CALLBACK/Conditional type), GPFS will filter and skip the unsupported ACE type from the ACL, resulting in a lossy ACL getting applied to the GPFS file or directory. Since conditional ACEs get filtered, GPFS does not support Dynamic Access Control (DAC)

  • Generation of AUDIT and ALARM events specified in a System Access Control List (SACL). GPFS is capable of storing SACL content, but will not interpret it.
  • The scanning of all files or directories that a particular SID owns (FSCTL_FIND_FILES_BY_SID)
  • Windows sparse files API
  • A change journal for file activity
  • Transactional NTFS (also known as TxF)