[Ocfs2-tools-devel] libocfs2 allocation of clusters and fsck

[Zach Brown]

> 	I've been pondering how to handle such an API for a while.  With
> the new chain allocator, I was figuring on having the library do exactly
> what the mounted filesystem does: follow chains.  That is, only read
> what is needed to do the alloc.

This is the method I prefer, I think.  I've always imagined that the
library API would do the bare minimum to allocate something on disk.

>  The alternative is to read every chain
> into memory and generate a flat bitmap like ext2fs does.

Is this just an optimization to avoid reads if there are lots of
allocations?  If so, it seems like something that can wait until we have
 basic correctness worked out.  Aren't these allocations going to be
wildly infrequent?

- z