VERITAS File System 3.5 (HP OnlineJFS/JFS 3.5) Administrator's Guide (August 2003)

Appendix A
VERITAS File System Quick Reference
Creating a File System
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Creating a File System
The mkfs command creates a VxFS file system by writing to a special character device file. The special
character device is a raw disk device or a VERITAS Volume Manager (VxVM) volume. mkfs builds a file
system with a root directory and a lost+found directory.
Before running mkfs, you must create the target device. Refer to your operating system documentation for
more information. If you are using a logical device (such as a VxVM volume), see the VxVM documentation for
instructions on device initialization.
How to Create a File System
To create a file system, use the mkfs command:
mkfs [-F vxfs] [ generic_options ] [-o specific_options ] special [size]
See the following manual pages for more information about creating VxFS file systems:
• mkfs (1M)
• mkfs_vxfs (1M)
Example
To create a VxFS file system 12288 sectors in size on VxVM volume, enter:
# mkfs -F vxfs /dev/vx/rdsk/ diskgroup /volume 12288
Information similar to the following displays:
version 5 layout
2088960 sectors, 2088960 blocks of size 1024, log size 1024 blocks
unlimited inodes, 2088960 data blocks, 2087344 free data blocks
64 allocation units of 32768 blocks, 32768 data blocks
last allocation unit has 24576 data blocks
first allocation unit starts at block 0
overhead per allocation unit is 0 blocks
At this point, you can mount the newly created file system.
vxfs The file system type.
generic_options Options common to most other file system types.
specific_options Options specific to VxFS.
-o N Displays the geometry of the file system and does not write to
the device.
-o largefiles Allows user to create files larger than two gigabytes.
special The character (raw) device or VERITAS Volume Manager
volume.
size The size of the new file system (in sectors).