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Linux is a family of open source Unix-like operating systems based on the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released on September 17, 1991 by Linus Torvalds. Linux is typically packaged in a Linux distribution (or distro for short).

Distributions include the Linux kernel and supporting system software and libraries, many of which are provided by the GNU Project. Many Linux distributions use the word "Linux" in their name, but the Free Software Foundation uses the name GNU/Linux to emphasize the importance of GNU software, causing some controversy.

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Benefit of a subvolume below the top level btrfs subvolume? (programming.dev)

submitted 2 weeks ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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According to the archwiki article on a swapfile on btrfs: https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Btrfs#Swap_file

Tip: Consider creating the subvolume directly below the top-level subvolume, e.g. @swap. Then, make sure the subvolume is mounted to /swap (or any other accessible location).

But... why? I've been researching for a bit now, and I still don't understand the benefit of a subvolume directly below the top level subvolume, as opposed to a nested subvolume.

At first I thought this might be because nested subvolumes are included in snapshots, but that doesn't seem to be the case, according to a reddit post... but I can't find anything about this on the arch wiki, gentoo wiki, or the btrfs readthedocs page.

Any ideas? I feel like the tip wouldn't just be there just because.

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[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago)

Not a specialist, but I suppose it has to do with having different configurations for different top level folder. In Unix-like systems, every top level folder have a different purpose, and what works for the root may not for /tmp, /swap, etc.

In those example, no need to snapshot /tmp, as it is a forder whose file are bound to be deleted, and for which being able to restore has no use.
/swap is pretty similar ~~, and is often formated with a dedicated filesystem.~~
/usr often only change during the package manager transactions, so snapshots are often tied to that, while /home may be set to keep daily snapshots.