LVMTHIN(7) Miscellaneous Information Manual LVMTHIN(7)
NAME
lvmthin — LVM thin provisioning
DESCRIPTION
Blocks in a standard lvm(8) Logical Volume (LV) are allocated when the
LV is created, but blocks in a thin provisioned LV are allocated as they
are written. Because of this, a thin provisioned LV has a virtual size
that can be much larger than the available physical storage. The amount
of physical storage provided for thin provisioned LVs can be increased
later as the need arises.
Blocks in a standard LV are allocated (during creation) from the Volume
Group (VG), but blocks in a thin LV are allocated (during use) from a
"thin pool". The thin pool contains blocks of physical storage, and
thin LV blocks reference blocks in the thin pool.
A special "thin pool LV" must be created before thin LVs can be created
within it. A thin pool LV is created by combining two standard LVs: a
data LV that will hold blocks for thin LVs, and a metadata LV that will
hold metadata. Thin pool metadata is created and used by the dm-thin
kernel module to track the data blocks used by thin LVs.
Snapshots of thin LVs are efficient because the data blocks common to a
thin LV and any of its snapshots are shared. Snapshots may be taken of
thin LVs or of other thin snapshots. Blocks common to recursive snap-
shots are also shared in the thin pool. There is no limit to or degra-
dation from sequences of snapshots.
As thin LVs or snapshot LVs are written to, they consume data blocks in
the thin pool. As free data blocks in the pool decrease, more physical
space may need to be added to the pool. This is done by extending the
thin pool with additional physical space from the VG. Removing thin LVs
or snapshots from the thin pool can also make more space available.
However, removing thin LVs is not always an effective way of freeing
space in a thin pool because blocks may be shared by snapshots, and free
blocks may be too fragmented to make available.
On-demand block allocation can cause thin LV blocks to be fragmented in
the thin pool, which can cause reduced performance compared to standard
fully provisioned LV.
DEFINITIONS
Thin LV
A thin LV is an LVM logical volume for which storage is allocated on de-
mand. As a thin LV is written, blocks are allocated from a thin pool to
hold the data. A thin LV has a virtual size that can be larger than the
physical space in the thin pool.
Thin Pool
A thin pool is a special LV containing physical extents from which thin
LVs are allocated. The thin pool LV is not used as a block device, but
the thin pool name is referenced when creating thin LVs. The thin pool
LV must be extended with additional physical extents before it runs out
of space. A thin pool has two hidden component LVs: one for holding
thin data and another for holding thin metadata.
Thin Pool Data LV
A component of a thin pool that holds thin LV data. The data LV is a
hidden LV with a _tdata suffix, and is not used directly. The physical
size of the data LV is displayed as the thin pool size.
Thin Pool Metadata LV
A component of a thin pool that holds metadata for the dm-thin kernel
module. dm-thin generates and uses this metadata to track data blocks
used by thin LVs. The metadata LV is a hidden LV with a _tmeta suffix,
and is not used directly.
Thin Snapshot
A thin snapshot is a thin LV that is created in reference to an existing
thin LV or other thin snapshot. The thin snapshot initially refers to
the same blocks as the existing thin LV. It acts as a point in time
copy of the thin LV it referenced.
External Origin
A read-only LV that is used as a snapshot origin for thin LVs. Unwrit-
ten portions of the thin LVs are read from the external origin.
USAGE
Thin Pool Creation
A thin pool can be created with the lvcreate command. The data and
metadata component LVs are each allocated from the VG, and combined into
a thin pool. The lvcreate -L|--size will be the size of the thin pool
data LV, and the size of the metadata LV will be calculated automati-
cally (or, can be optionally specified with --poolmetadatasize.)
$ lvcreate --type thin-pool -n ThinPool -L Size VG
Thin Pool Conversion
For a customized thin pool layout, data and metadata LVs can be created
separately, and then combined into a thin pool with lvconvert. This al-
lows specific LV types, or specific devices, to be used for data/meta-
data LVs. Combining the data and metadata LVs into a thin pool erases
the content of both LVs. The resulting thin pool takes the name and
size of the data LV. (If a metadata LV is not specified, lvconvert will
automatically create one to use in the thin pool.)
$ lvcreate -n DataLV -L Size VG DataDevices
$ lvcreate -n MetadataLV -L MetadataSize VG MetadataDevices
$ lvconvert --type thin-pool --poolmetadata MetadataLV VG/DataLV
(DataLV would now be referred to as ThinPool, and can be used for creat-
ing thin LVs.)
Thin LV Creation
Thin LVs are created in a thin pool, and are created with a virtual size
using the option -V|--virtualsize. The virtual size may be larger than
the physical space available in the thin pool.
$ lvcreate --type thin -n ThinLV -V VirtualSize --thinpool ThinPool VG
Thin Snapshot Creation
Snapshots of thin LVs are thin LVs themselves, but the snapshot LV ini-
tially refers to the same blocks as the origin thin LV. The origin thin
LV and its snapshot thin LVs will diverge as either are written. The
origin thin LV can be removed without affecting snapshots that reference
it. Snapshots can be taken of thin LVs that were themselves created as
snapshots. (A size option must not be used when creating a thin snap-
shot, otherwise a COW snapshot will be created.)
$ lvcreate --snapshot -n SnapLV VG/ThinLV
Thin Pool Data Percent and Metadata Percent
For active thin pool LVs, the 'lvs' command displays "Data%" (-o
data_percent) and "Meta%" (-o metadata_percent). Data percent is the
percent of space in the data LV that is currently used by thin LVs.
Metadata percent is the percent of space in the metadata LV that is cur-
rently used by the dm-thin module. The thin pool should be extended be-
fore either of these values reach 100%.
$ lvs -o data_percent VG/ThinPool
$ lvs -o metadata_percent VG/ThinPool
Thin Pool Extension
When lvextend is run on a thin pool, it will extend the internal data LV
by the specified amount, and the internal metadata LV will also be ex-
tended, if needed, relative to the new data size.
$ lvextend --size Size VG/ThinPool
A new metadata size can be requested when extending the thin pool data.
$ lvextend --size Size --poolmetadatasize MetadataSize VG/ThinPool
The metadata size can be extended without extending the data size.
$ lvextend --poolmetadatasize MetadataSize VG/ThinPool
The internal data or metadata LV can be extended by name.
$ lvextend -L Size VG/ThinPool_tdata
$ lvextend -L MetadataSize VG/ThinPool_tmeta
Thin Pool Automatic Extension
It is important to extend a thin pool before it runs out of space, oth-
erwise it may be damaged, and difficult or impossible to repair. LVM
can be configured so that dmeventd automatically extends thin pools when
they run low on space. Free extents must be available in the VG to use
for extending the thin pools.
dmeventd is usually started by the lvm2-monitor service. dmeventd re-
ceives notifications from the kernel indicating when thin pool data or
metadata are becoming full. In response, dmeventd runs the command
"lvextend --use-policies VG/ThinPool", which compares the current usage
of data and metadata with the autoextend threshold. The data LV and/or
metadata LV may be extended in response. System messages will show when
these extensions have happened.
To enable thin pool automatic extension, set lvm.conf:
• thin_pool_autoextend_threshold
Extend the thin pool when the current usage reaches this percentage.
The chosen value should depend on the rate at which new data may be
written. If space is consumed more quickly, then a lower threshold
will provide dmeventd and lvextend more time to react and extend the
pool. The minimum is 50. Setting to 100 disables autoextend.
• thin_pool_autoextend_percent
A thin pool is extended by this percent of its current size.
The thin pool itself must be monitored by dmeventd to be automatically
extended. When activating a thin pool, lvm normally requests monitoring
by dmeventd. To verify this, run:
$ lvs -o+seg_monitor VG/ThinPool
To begin monitoring a thin pool in dmeventd:
$ lvchange --monitor y VG/ThinPool
Thin LV Activation
A thin LV that is created as a snapshot is given the "skip activation"
property. It is reported with lvs -o skip_activation, or 'k' in the
tenth lv_attr. This property causes vgchange -ay and lvchange -ay com-
mands to skip activating the thin LV unless the -K|--ignoreactivation-
skip option is also set.
$ lvchange -ay -K VG/SnapLV
The skip activation property on a thin LV can be cleared, so that -K is
not required to activate it (or enabled so -K is required.)
$ lvchange --setactivationskip y|n VG/SnapLV
To configure the "skip activation" setting that lvcreate applies to new
snapshots, set lvm.conf:
auto_set_activation_skip
Thick LV to Thin LV Conversion
A thick LV (e.g. linear, striped) can be converted to a thin LV in a new
thin pool. The new thin pool is created using the existing thick LV as
thin pool data. New thin pool metadata is generated and written to a
new metadata LV. The new thin LV references the original thick data now
located in the thin pool data LV. Note: This conversion cannot be re-
versed; the thin volume cannot be reverted back to the thick LV.
$ lvconvert --type thin VG/ThickLV
(ThickLV would now be referred to as ThinLV, and a new thin pool will
exist named ThinLV_tpool0.)
After the conversion, the resulting thin LV and thin pool will look
somewhat different from ordinary thin LVs/pools: the new thin LV will be
fully provisioned in the thin pool, and the thin pool data usage will be
100%. The thin pool will require extension before new thin LVs or snap-
shots are used.
Thin Pool on LVM RAID
Thin pool data or metadata component LVs can use LVM RAID by first cre-
ating RAID LVs for data and/or metadata component LVs, and then convert-
ing these RAID LVs into a thin pool.
$ lvcreate --type raidN -n DataLV -L Size VG DataDevices
$ lvcreate --type raidN -n MetadataLV -L MetadataSize VG MetadataDevices
$ lvconvert --type thin-pool --poolmetadata MetadataLV VG/DataLV
(DataLV would now be referred to as ThinPool, and can be used for creat-
ing thin LVs.)
To use MD RAID instead of LVM RAID, create linear data/metadata LVs on
MD devices, and refer to the MD devices for DataDevices/MetadataDevices.
Thin Pool on LVM VDO
Thin pool data can be compressed and deduplicated using VDO. Data for
all thin LVs in the thin pool will be compressed and deduplicated using
the dm-vdo module.
$ lvcreate --type thin-pool -n ThinPool -L Size --pooldatavdo y VG
Or, convert an existing LV (e.g. linear, striped) into a thin-pool that
uses VDO compression/deduplication for thin data. Existing content on
the LV will be erased.
$ lvconvert --type thin-pool --pooldatavdo y VG/LV
(LV would now be referred to as ThinPool, and can be used for creating
thin LVs.)
Thin Pool and Thin LV Combined Creation
One command can be used to create a new thin pool with a new thin LV.
$ lvcreate --type thin -n ThinLV -V VirtualSize \
--thinpool ThinPool -L ThinPoolSize VG
First, a new thin pool is created:
Thin Pool name is from --thinpool ThinPool
Thin Pool size is from -L|--size ThinPoolSize
Second, a new thin LV is created:
Thin LV name is from -n|--name ThinLV
Thin LV size is from -V|--virtualsize VirtualSize
Other thin LVs can then be created in the thin pool using standard
lvcreate commands for thin LVs.
Thin Snapshot Creation of an External Origin
Thin snapshots are typically taken of other thin LVs within the same
thin pool. But, it is also possible to create a thin snapshot of an ex-
ternal LV (e.g. linear, striped, thin LV in another thin pool.) The ex-
ternal LV must be read-only (lvchange --permission r) and inactive to be
used as a thin external origin. Writes to the thin snapshot LV are
stored in its thin pool, and unwritten parts are read from the external
origin. One external origin LV can be used for multiple thin snapshots.
$ lvcreate --snapshot -n SnapLV --thinpool ThinPool VG/ExternalOrigin
Thin Snapshot and External Origin Conversion
In this case, an existing, non-thin LV is converted to a read-only ex-
ternal origin, and a new thin LV is created as a snapshot of that exter-
nal origin. The new thin LV is given the name of the existing LV, and
the existing LV is given a new name from --originname.
Unwritten portions of the new thin LV are read from the external origin.
If the thin LV is removed, the external origin LV can be used again in
read/write mode. Thus, the thin LV can be seen as a snapshot of the
original volume.
$ lvconvert --type thin --thinpool ThinPool --originname ExtOrigin VG/LV
The existing LV argument is renamed ExtOrigin, and the new thin LV has
the name of the existing LV.
Thin Snapshot Merge
A thin snapshot can be merged into its origin thin LV. The result of a
snapshot merge is that the origin thin LV takes the content of the snap-
shot LV, and the snapshot LV is removed. Any content that was unique to
the origin thin LV is lost after the merge.
Because a merge changes the content of an LV, it cannot be done while
the LVs are open, e.g. mounted. If a merge is initiated while the LVs
are open, the effect of the merge is delayed until the origin thin LV is
next activated.
$ lvconvert --merge VG/SnapLV
EXAMPLES
Thin Pool Creation
# lvcreate --type thin-pool -n pool0 -L 500M vg
# lvs -a vg
LV VG Attr LSize Data% Meta%
[lvol0_pmspare] vg ewi------- 4.00m
pool0 vg twi-a-tz-- 500.00m 0.00 10.84
[pool0_tdata] vg Twi-ao---- 500.00m
[pool0_tmeta] vg ewi-ao---- 4.00m
Thin Pool Conversion
# lvcreate -n pool0 -L 500M vg
# lvcreate -n pool0_meta -L 100M vg
# lvconvert --type thin-pool --poolmetadata pool0_meta vg/pool0
# lvs -a vg
LV VG Attr LSize Data% Meta%
[lvol0_pmspare] vg ewi------- 100.00m
pool0 vg twi-a-tz-- 500.00m 0.00 10.04
[pool0_tdata] vg Twi-ao---- 500.00m
[pool0_tmeta] vg ewi-ao---- 100.00m
Thin LV Creation
# lvcreate --type thin-pool -n pool0 -L 500M vg
# lvcreate --type thin -n vol -V 1G --thinpool pool0 vg
# lvs -a vg
LV VG Attr LSize Pool Data% Meta%
[lvol0_pmspare] vg ewi------- 4.00m
pool0 vg twi-aotz-- 500.00m 0.00 10.94
[pool0_tdata] vg Twi-ao---- 500.00m
[pool0_tmeta] vg ewi-ao---- 4.00m
vol vg Vwi-a-tz-- 1.00g pool0 0.00
Thin Snapshot Creation
# lvcreate --type thin-pool -n pool0 -L 500M vg
# lvcreate --type thin -n vol -V 1G --thinpool pool0 vg
# lvcreate --snapshot -n snap1 vg/vol
# lvcreate --snapshot -n snap2 vg/snap1
# lvs -a vg
LV VG Attr LSize Pool Origin Data% Meta%
[lvol0_pmspare] vg ewi------- 4.00m
pool0 vg twi-aotz-- 500.00m 0.00 10.94
[pool0_tdata] vg Twi-ao---- 500.00m
[pool0_tmeta] vg ewi-ao---- 4.00m
snap1 vg Vwi---tz-k 1.00g pool0 vol
snap2 vg Vwi---tz-k 1.00g pool0 snap1
vol vg Vwi-a-tz-- 1.00g pool0 0.00
Thin Pool Extension
# lvcreate --type thin-pool -n pool0 -L 500M vg
# lvextend -L+100M vg/pool0
# lvs -a vg
LV VG Attr LSize Data% Meta%
[lvol0_pmspare] vg ewi------- 4.00m
pool0 vg twi-a-tz-- 600.00m 0.00 10.84
[pool0_tdata] vg Twi-ao---- 600.00m
[pool0_tmeta] vg ewi-ao---- 4.00m
# lvextend -L+100M --poolmetadatasize 8M vg/pool0
# lvs -a vg
LV VG Attr LSize Data% Meta%
[lvol0_pmspare] vg ewi------- 8.00m
pool0 vg twi-a-tz-- 700.00m 0.00 10.40
[pool0_tdata] vg Twi-ao---- 700.00m
[pool0_tmeta] vg ewi-ao---- 8.00m
Thick LV to Thin LV Conversion
# lvcreate -n vol -L500M vg
# lvconvert --type thin vg/vol
# lvs -a vg
LV VG Attr LSize Pool Data% Meta%
[lvol0_pmspare] vg ewi------- 4.00m
vol vg Vwi-a-tz-- 500.00m vol_tpool0 100.00
vol_tpool0 vg twi-aotz-- 500.00m 100.00 14.06
[vol_tpool0_tdata] vg Twi-ao---- 500.00m
[vol_tpool0_tmeta] vg ewi-ao---- 4.00m
# lvextend -L1G vg/vol
# lvs -a vg
LV VG Attr LSize Pool Data% Meta%
[lvol0_pmspare] vg ewi------- 4.00m
vol vg Vwi-a-tz-- 1.00g vol_tpool0 48.83
vol_tpool0 vg twi-aotz-- 1000.00m 50.00 14.06
[vol_tpool0_tdata] vg Twi-ao---- 1000.00m
[vol_tpool0_tmeta] vg ewi-ao---- 4.00m
(Extending the virtual size of the thin LV triggered autoextend of the
thin pool.)
Thin Pool on LVM RAID
# lvcreate --type raid1 -n pool0 -m1 -L500M vg
# lvcreate --type raid1 -n pool0_meta -m1 -L8M vg
# lvs -a vg
LV VG Attr LSize Cpy%Sync
pool0 vg rwi-a-r--- 500.00m 100.00
pool0_meta vg rwi-a-r--- 8.00m 100.00
[pool0_meta_rimage_0] vg iwi-aor--- 8.00m
[pool0_meta_rimage_1] vg iwi-aor--- 8.00m
[pool0_meta_rmeta_0] vg ewi-aor--- 4.00m
[pool0_meta_rmeta_1] vg ewi-aor--- 4.00m
[pool0_rimage_0] vg iwi-aor--- 500.00m
[pool0_rimage_1] vg iwi-aor--- 500.00m
[pool0_rmeta_0] vg ewi-aor--- 4.00m
[pool0_rmeta_1] vg ewi-aor--- 4.00m
# lvconvert --type thin-pool --poolmetadata pool0_meta vg/pool0
# lvs -a vg
LV VG Attr LSize Data% Meta% Cpy%Sync
[lvol0_pmspare] vg ewi------- 8.00m
pool0 vg twi-a-tz-- 500.00m 0.00 10.40
[pool0_tdata] vg rwi-aor--- 500.00m 100.00
[pool0_tdata_rimage_0] vg iwi-aor--- 500.00m
[pool0_tdata_rimage_1] vg iwi-aor--- 500.00m
[pool0_tdata_rmeta_0] vg ewi-aor--- 4.00m
[pool0_tdata_rmeta_1] vg ewi-aor--- 4.00m
[pool0_tmeta] vg ewi-aor--- 8.00m 100.00
[pool0_tmeta_rimage_0] vg iwi-aor--- 8.00m
[pool0_tmeta_rimage_1] vg iwi-aor--- 8.00m
[pool0_tmeta_rmeta_0] vg ewi-aor--- 4.00m
[pool0_tmeta_rmeta_1] vg ewi-aor--- 4.00m
Thin Pool on LVM VDO Creation
# lvcreate --type thin-pool -n pool0 -L5G --pooldatavdo y vg
# lvs -a vg
LV VG Attr LSize Pool Data% Meta%
[lvol0_pmspare] vg ewi------- 8.00m
pool0 vg twi-a-tz-- 5.00g 0.00 10.64
[pool0_tdata] vg vwi-aov--- 5.00g pool0_vpool0 0.00
[pool0_tmeta] vg ewi-ao---- 8.00m
pool0_vpool0 vg dwi------- 5.00g 60.03
[pool0_vpool0_vdata] vg Dwi-ao---- 5.00g
Thin Pool on LVM VDO Conversion
# lvcreate -n pool0 -L5G vg
# lvconvert --type thin-pool --pooldatavdo y vg/pool0
# lvs -a vg
LV VG Attr LSize Pool Data% Meta%
[lvol0_pmspare] vg ewi------- 8.00m
pool0 vg twi-a-tz-- 5.00g 0.00 10.64
[pool0_tdata] vg vwi-aov--- 5.00g pool0_vpool0 0.00
[pool0_tmeta] vg ewi-ao---- 8.00m
pool0_vpool0 vg dwi------- 5.00g 60.03
[pool0_vpool0_vdata] vg Dwi-ao---- 5.00g
Thin Snapshot Creation of an External Origin
# lvcreate -n vol -L 500M vg
# lvchange --permission r vg/vol
# lvchange -an vg/vol
# lvcreate --type thin-pool -n pool0 -L 500M vg
# lvcreate --snapshot -n snap --thinpool pool0 vg/vol
# lvs -a vg
LV VG Attr LSize Pool Origin Data% Meta%
[lvol0_pmspare] vg ewi------- 4.00m
pool0 vg twi-aotz-- 500.00m 0.00 10.94
[pool0_tdata] vg Twi-ao---- 500.00m
[pool0_tmeta] vg ewi-ao---- 4.00m
snap vg Vwi-a-tz-- 500.00m pool0 vol 0.00
vol vg ori------- 500.00m
Thin Pool and Thin LV Combined Creation
# lvcreate --type thin -n vol -V 1G --thinpool pool0 -L500M vg
# lvs -a vg
LV VG Attr LSize Pool Data% Meta%
[lvol0_pmspare] vg ewi------- 4.00m
pool0 vg twi-aotz-- 500.00m 0.00 10.94
[pool0_tdata] vg Twi-ao---- 500.00m
[pool0_tmeta] vg ewi-ao---- 4.00m
vol vg Vwi-a-tz-- 1.00g pool0 0.00
Thin Snapshot Merge
# lvcreate --type thin-pool -n pool0 -L500M vg
# lvcreate --type thin -n vol -V 1G --thinpool pool0 vg
# lvcreate --snapshot -n snap vg/vol
# lvs -a vg
LV VG Attr LSize Pool Origin Data% Meta%
[lvol0_pmspare] vg ewi------- 4.00m
pool0 vg twi-aotz-- 500.00m 0.00 10.94
[pool0_tdata] vg Twi-ao---- 500.00m
[pool0_tmeta] vg ewi-ao---- 4.00m
snap vg Vwi---tz-k 1.00g pool0 vol
vol vg Vwi-a-tz-- 1.00g pool0 0.00
# lvconvert --merge vg/snap
# lvs -a vg
LV VG Attr LSize Pool Data% Meta%
[lvol0_pmspare] vg ewi------- 4.00m
pool0 vg twi-aotz-- 500.00m 0.00 10.94
[pool0_tdata] vg Twi-ao---- 500.00m
[pool0_tmeta] vg ewi-ao---- 4.00m
vol vg Vwi-a-tz-- 1.00g pool0 0.00
Thin Snapshot Merge Delayed
# lvcreate --type thin-pool -n pool0 -L500M vg
# lvcreate --type thin -n vol -V 1G --thinpool pool0 vg
# mkfs.xfs /dev/vg/vol
# mount /dev/vg/vol /mnt
# touch /mnt/file1 /mnt/file2 /mnt/file3
# lvcreate --snapshot -n snap vg/vol
# mount /dev/vg/snap /snap -o nouuid
# touch /snap/file4 /snap/file5 /snap/file6
# ls /snap
file1 file2 file3 file4 file5 file6
# ls /mnt
file1 file2 file3
# lvconvert --merge vg/snap
Logical volume vg/snap contains a filesystem in use.
Delaying merge since snapshot is open.
Merging of thin snapshot vg/snap will occur on next activation of vg/vol.
# umount /snap
# umount /mnt
# lvchange -an vg/vol
# lvs -a vg
LV VG Attr LSize Pool Origin Data% Meta%
[lvol0_pmspare] vg ewi------- 4.00m
pool0 vg twi-aotz-- 500.00m 13.36 11.62
[pool0_tdata] vg Twi-ao---- 500.00m
[pool0_tmeta] vg ewi-ao---- 4.00m
[snap] vg Swi---tz-k 1.00g pool0 vol
vol vg Owi---tz-- 1.00g pool0
# lvchange -ay vg/vol
# lvs -a vg
LV VG Attr LSize Pool Data% Meta%
[lvol0_pmspare] vg ewi------- 4.00m
pool0 vg twi-aotz-- 500.00m 12.94 11.43
[pool0_tdata] vg Twi-ao---- 500.00m
[pool0_tmeta] vg ewi-ao---- 4.00m
vol vg Vwi-a-tz-- 1.00g pool0 6.32
# mount /dev/vg/vol /mnt
# ls /mnt
file1 file2 file3 file4 file5 file6
SPECIAL TOPICS
Physical Devices for Thin Pool Data and Metadata
Placing the thin pool data LV and metadata LV on separate physical de-
vices will improve performance. Faster, redundant devices for metadata
is also recommended. To best customize the data and metadata LVs, cre-
ate them separately and then combine them into a thin pool with lvcon-
vert.
To configure lvcreate behavior to place thin pool data and metadata on
separate devices, set lvm.conf:
thin_pool_metadata_require_separate_pvs
Spare Metadata LV
The first time a thin pool LV is created, lvm will create a spare meta-
data LV in the VG. This behavior can be controlled with the option
--poolmetadataspare y|n. To create the pmspare ("pool metadata spare")
LV, lvm first creates an LV with a default name, e.g. lvol0, and then
converts this LV to a hidden LV with the _pmspare suffix, e.g.
lvol0_pmspare.
One pmspare LV is kept in a VG to be used for any thin pool.
The pmspare LV cannot be created explicitly, but may be removed explic-
itly.
The "Thin Pool Metadata check and repair" section describes the use of
the pmspare LV.
Thin Pool Metadata check and repair
If thin pool metadata is damaged, it may be repairable. Checking and
repairing thin pool metadata is analogous to running fsck/repair on a
file system. Thin pool metadata is compact, so even small areas of dam-
age or corruption can result in significant data loss. Resilient stor-
age for thin pool metadata can have extra value.
When a thin pool LV is activated, lvm runs the thin_check(8) command to
check the correctness of the metadata on the pool metadata LV. To con-
figure thin_check use, location or options used by lvm, set lvm.conf:
thin_check_executable
The location of the program. Setting to an empty string ("") disables
running thin_check by lvm. This is not recommended.
thin_check_options
Controls the command options that lvm will use when running thin_check.
If thin_check finds a problem with the metadata, the thin pool LV is not
activated, and the thin pool metadata needs to be repaired.
Simple repair commands are not always successful. Advanced repair may
require editing thin pool metadata and lvm metadata. Newer versions of
the kernel and lvm tools may be more successful at repair. Report the
details of damaged thin metadata to get the best advice on recovery.
Command to repair a thin pool:
$ lvconvert --repair VG/ThinPool
Repair performs the following steps:
1 Creates a new, repaired copy of the metadata.
lvconvert runs the thin_repair(8) command to read damaged metadata
from the existing pool metadata LV, and writes a new repaired copy to
the VG's pmspare LV.
2 Replaces the thin pool metadata LV.
If step 1 is successful, the thin pool metadata LV is replaced with
the pmspare LV containing the corrected metadata. The previous thin
pool metadata LV, containing the damaged metadata, becomes visible
with the new name ThinPool_metaN (where N is 0,1,...).
If the repair works, the thin pool LV and its thin LVs can be activated.
The user should verify that each thin LV in the thin pool can be suc-
cessfully activated, and then verify the integrity of the file system on
each thin LV (e.g. using fsck or other tools.) Once the thin pool is
considered fully recovered, the ThinPool_metaN LV containing the origi-
nal, damaged metadata can be manually removed to recovery the space.
If the repair fails, the original, unmodified ThinPool_metaN LV should
be preserved for support, or more advanced recovery methods. Data from
thin LVs may ultimately be unrecoverable.
If metadata is manually restored with thin_repair directly, the pool
metadata LV can be manually swapped with another LV containing new meta-
data:
$ lvconvert --thinpool VG/ThinPool --poolmetadata VG/NewMetadataLV
Removing thin pool LVs, thin LVs and snapshots
Removing a thin LV and its related snapshots returns the blocks they
used to the thin pool. These blocks will be reused for other thin LVs
and snapshots.
Removing a thin pool LV removes both the data LV and metadata LV and re-
turns the space to the VG.
lvremove of thin pool LVs, thin LVs and snapshots cannot be reversed
with vgcfgrestore.
vgcfgbackup does not back up thin pool metadata.
Using fstrim to increase free space in a thin pool
Removing files in a file system on a thin LV does not generally return
free space to the thin pool, because file systems are not usually
mounted with the discard mount option (due to the performance penalty.)
Manually running the fstrim command can return space from a thin LV back
to the thin pool that had been used by removed files. This is only ef-
fective for entire thin pool chunks that have become unused (unused file
system areas may not cover an entire chunk.) Thin snapshots also keep
thin pool chunks from being freed. fstrim uses discards and will have
no effect if the thin pool is configured to ignore discards.
Example
A thin pool has 10G of physical data space, and a thin LV has a virtual
size of 100G. Writing a 1G file to the file system reduces the free
space in the thin pool by 10% and increases the virtual usage of the
file system by 1%. Removing the 1G file restores the virtual 1% to the
file system, but does not restore the physical 10% to the thin pool.
The fstrim command restores the physical space to the thin pool.
# lvs -a -oname,attr,size,pool_lv,origin,data_percent,metadata_percent vg
LV Attr LSize Pool Origin Data% Meta%
pool0 twi-a-tz-- 10.00g 47.01 21.03
thin1 Vwi-aotz-- 100.00g pool0 2.70
# df -h /mnt/X
Filesystem Size Used Avail Use% Mounted on
/dev/mapper/vg-thin1 99G 1.1G 93G 2% /mnt/X
# dd if=/dev/zero of=/mnt/X/1Gfile bs=4096 count=262144; sync
# lvs
pool0 vg twi-a-tz-- 10.00g 57.01 25.26
thin1 vg Vwi-aotz-- 100.00g pool0 3.70
# df -h /mnt/X
/dev/mapper/vg-thin1 99G 2.1G 92G 3% /mnt/X
# rm /mnt/X/1Gfile
# lvs
pool0 vg twi-a-tz-- 10.00g 57.01 25.26
thin1 vg Vwi-aotz-- 100.00g pool0 3.70
# df -h /mnt/X
/dev/mapper/vg-thin1 99G 1.1G 93G 2% /mnt/X
# fstrim -v /mnt/X
# lvs
pool0 vg twi-a-tz-- 10.00g 47.01 21.03
thin1 vg Vwi-aotz-- 100.00g pool0 2.70
Thin Pool Data Exhaustion
When properly managed, thin pool data space should be extended before it
is all used (see sections on extending a thin pool automatically and
manually.)
However, if a thin pool does run out of space, the behavior of the full
thin pool can be configured with the "when full" property, reported with
lvs -o whenfull. The "when full" property can be set to "error" or
"queue". When set to "error", a full thin pool will immediately return
errors for writes. When set to "queue", writes are queued for a period
of time.
Display the current "when full" setting:
$ lvs -o whenfull VG/ThinPool
Set the "when full" property to "error":
$ lvchange --errorwhenfull y VG/ThinPool
Set the "when full" property to "queue":
$ lvchange --errorwhenfull n VG/ThinPool
To configure the value that will be assigned to new thin pools, set
lvm.conf:
error_when_full
The whenfull setting does not effect the monitoring and autoextend set-
tings, and the monitoring/autoextend settings do not effect the whenfull
setting. It is only when monitoring/autoextend are not effective that
the thin pool becomes full and the whenfull setting is applied.
— queue when full —
The default is to queue writes for a period of time when the thin pool
becomes full. Writes to thin LVs are accepted and queued, with the ex-
pectation that pool data space will be extended soon. Once data space
is extended, the queued writes will be processed, and the thin pool will
return to normal operation.
While waiting to be extended, the thin pool will queue writes for up to
60 seconds (the default). If data space has not been extended after
this time, the queued writes will return an error to the caller, e.g.
the file system. This can result in file system damage that requires
repair. When a thin pool returns errors for writes to a thin LV, any
file system is subject to losing unsynced user data.
The 60 second timeout can be changed or disabled with the dm-thin-pool
kernel module option no_space_timeout. This option sets the number of
seconds that thin pools will queue writes. If set to 0, writes will not
time out. Disabling timeouts can result in the system running out of
resources, memory exhaustion, hung tasks, and deadlocks. (The timeout
applies to all thin pools on the system.)
— error when full —
Writes to thin LVs immediately return an error, and no writes are
queued. This can result in file system damage that requires repair.
— data percent —
When data space is exhausted, the lvs command displays 100 under Data%
for the thin pool LV:
# lvs -o name,data_percent vg/pool0
LV Data%
pool0 100.00
— causes —
A thin pool may run out of data space for any of the following reasons:
• Automatic extension of the thin pool is disabled, and the thin pool is
not manually extended. (Disabling automatic extension is not recom-
mended.)
• The dmeventd daemon is not running and the thin pool is not manually
extended. (Disabling dmeventd is not recommended.)
• Automatic extension of the thin pool is too slow given the rate of
writes to thin LVs in the pool. (This can be addressed by tuning the
thin_pool_autoextend_threshold and thin_pool_autoextend_percent.)
• The VG does not have enough free blocks to extend the thin pool.
Thin Pool Metadata Exhaustion
If thin pool metadata space is exhausted (or a thin pool metadata opera-
tion fails), errors will be returned for IO operations on thin LVs.
When metadata space is exhausted, the lvs command displays 100 under
Meta% for the thin pool LV:
# lvs -o name,metadata_percent vg/pool0
LV Meta%
pool0 100.00
The same reasons for thin pool data space exhaustion apply to thin pool
metadata space.
Metadata space exhaustion can lead to inconsistent thin pool metadata
and inconsistent file systems, so the response requires offline checking
and repair.
1. Deactivate the thin pool LV, or reboot the system if this is not
possible.
2. Repair thin pool with lvconvert --repair.
See "Thin Pool Metadata check and repair".
3. Extend pool metadata space with lvextend --poolmetadatasize.
See "Thin Pool Extension".
4. Check and repair file system.
Custom Thin Pool Configuration
It can be useful for different thin pools to have different thin pool
settings like autoextend thresholds and percents. To change lvm.conf
values on a per-VG or per-LV basis, attach a "profile" to the VG or LV.
A profile is a collection of config settings, saved in a local text file
(using the lvm.conf format). lvm looks for profiles in the profile_dir
directory, e.g. /etc/lvm/profile/. Once attached to a VG or LV, lvm
will process the VG or LV using the settings from the attached profile.
A profile is named and referenced by its file name.
To use a profile to customize the lvextend settings for an LV:
• Create a file containing settings, saved in profile_dir.
For the profile_dir location, run:
$ lvmconfig config/profile_dir
• Attach the profile to an LV, using the command:
$ lvchange --metadataprofile ProfileName VG/ThinPool
• Extend the LV using the profile settings:
$ lvextend --use-policies VG/ThinPool
Example
# lvmconfig config/profile_dir
profile_dir="/etc/lvm/profile"
# cat /etc/lvm/profile/pool0extend.profile
activation {
thin_pool_autoextend_threshold=50
thin_pool_autoextend_percent=10
}
# lvchange --metadataprofile pool0extend vg/pool0
# lvextend --use-policies vg/pool0
Notes
• A profile is attached to a VG or LV by name, where the name references
a local file in profile_dir. If the VG is moved to another machine,
the file with the profile also needs to be moved.
• Only certain settings can be used in a VG or LV profile, see:
$ lvmconfig --type profilable-metadata
• An LV without a profile of its own will inherit the VG profile.
• Remove a profile from an LV using the command:
$ lvchange --detachprofile VG/ThinPool
• Commands can also have profiles applied to them. The settings that
can be applied to a command are different than the settings that can
be applied to a VG or LV. See lvmconfig --type profilable-command.
To apply a profile to a command, write a profile, save it in the pro-
file directory, and run the command using the option: --commandprofile
ProfileName.
Zeroing
The "zero" property of a thin pool determines if chunks are overwritten
with zeros when they are provisioned for a thin LV. The current setting
is reported with lvs -o zero (displaying "zero" or "1" when zeroing is
enabled), or 'z' in the eighth lv_attr. The option -Z|--zero is used to
specify the zeroing mode.
Create a thin pool with zeroing mode:
$ lvcreate --type thin-pool -n ThinPool -L Size -Z y|n VG
Change the zeroing mode of an existing thin pool:
$ lvchange -Z y|n VG/ThinPool
If zeroing mode is changed from "n" to "y", previously provisioned
blocks are not zeroed.
Provisioning of large zeroed chunks reduces performance.
To configure the zeroing mode used for new thin pools when not specified
on the command line, set lvm.conf:
thin_pool_zero
Discard
The "discards" property of a thin pool determines how discard requests
are handled. The current setting is reported with lvs -o discards. The
option --discards is used to specify the discards mode.
Possible discard modes:
ignore: Ignore any discards that are received.
nopassdown: Process any discards in the thin pool itself, and allow the
newly unused chunks to be used for new data.
passdown: Process discards in the thin pool (as with nopassdown), and
pass the discards down the underlying device. This is the default mode.
Create a thin pool with a specific discards mode:
$ lvcreate --type thin-pool -n ThinPool -L Size
--discards ignore|nopassdown|passdown VG
Change the discards mode of an existing thin pool:
$ lvchange --discards ignore|nopassdown|passdown VG/ThinPool
To configure the discards mode used for new thin pools when not speci-
fied on the command line, set lvm.conf:
thin_pool_discards
Discards can have an adverse impact on performance, see the fstrim sec-
tion for more information.
Chunk size
A thin pool allocates physical storage for thin LVs in units of
"chunks". The current chunk size of a thin pool is reported with lvs -o
chunksize. The option --chunksize is used to specify the value for a
new thin pool (default units are KiB.) The value must be a multiple of
64 KiB, between 64 KiB and 1 GiB.
When a thin pool is used primarily for the thin provisioning feature, a
larger value is optimal. To optimize for many snapshots, a smaller
value reduces copying time and consumes less space.
To configure the chunk size used for new thin pools when not specified
on the command line, set lvm.conf:
thin_pool_chunk_size
The default value is shown by:
$ lvmconfig --type default allocation/thin_pool_chunk_size
Thin Pool Metadata Size
The amount of thin pool metadata depends on how many blocks are shared
between thin LVs (i.e. through snapshots). A thin pool with many snap-
shots may need a larger metadata LV. Thin pool metadata LV sizes can be
from 2 MiB to approximately 16 GiB.
When an LVM command automatically creates a thin pool metadata LV, the
size is specified with the --poolmetadatasize option. When this option
is not given, LVM automatically chooses a size based on the data size
and chunk size.
It can be hard to predict the amount of metadata space that will be
needed, so it is recommended to start with a size of 1 GiB which should
be enough for all practical purposes. A thin pool metadata LV can later
be manually or automatically extended if needed.
(For purposes of backward compatibility, lvm.conf setting alloca-
tion/thin_pool_crop_metadata controls cropping the metadata LV size to
15.81 GiB to be backward compatible with older versions of lvm. With
cropping, there can be problems with volumes above this size when used
with thin tools, i.e. thin_repair. Cropping should be enabled only when
compatibility is required.)
XFS on snapshots
Mounting an XFS file system on a new snapshot LV requires attention to
the file system's log state and uuid. On the snapshot LV, the xfs log
will contain a dummy transaction, and the xfs uuid will match the uuid
from the file system on the origin LV.
If the snapshot LV is writable, mounting will recover the log to clear
the dummy transaction, but will require skipping the uuid check:
# mount /dev/VG/SnapLV /mnt -o nouuid
After the first mount with the above approach, the UUID can subsequently
be changed using:
# xfs_admin -U generate /dev/VG/SnapLV
# mount /dev/VG/SnapLV /mnt
Once the UUID has been changed, the mount command will no longer require
the nouuid option.
If the snapshot LV is readonly, the log recovery and uuid check need to
be skipped while mounting readonly:
# mount /dev/VG/SnapLV /mnt -o ro,nouuid,norecovery
SEE ALSO
lvm(8), lvm.conf(5), lvmconfig(8), lvcreate(8), lvconvert(8),
lvchange(8), lvextend(8), lvremove(8), lvs(8),
thin_check(8), thin_dump(8), thin_repair(8), thin_restore(8),
vdoformat(8), vdostats(8)
Red Hat, Inc LVM TOOLS 2.03.31(2) (2025-02-27) LVMTHIN(7)
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