[PATCH v2 1/4] erofs: add file-backed mount support

[Gao Xiang]

Hi Sandeep,

On 2024/8/31 08:30, Sandeep Dhavale via Linux-erofs wrote:
> On Thu, Aug 29, 2024 at 8:29 PM Gao Xiang <hsiangkao at linux.alibaba.com> wrote:
>>
>> It actually has been around for years: For containers and other sandbox
>> use cases, there will be thousands (and even more) of authenticated
>> (sub)images running on the same host, unlike OS images.
>>
>> Of course, all scenarios can use the same EROFS on-disk format, but
>> bdev-backed mounts just work well for OS images since golden data is
>> dumped into real block devices.  However, it's somewhat hard for
>> container runtimes to manage and isolate so many unnecessary virtual
>> block devices safely and efficiently [1]: they just look like a burden
>> to orchestrators and file-backed mounts are preferred indeed.  There
>> were already enough attempts such as Incremental FS, the original
>> ComposeFS and PuzzleFS acting in the same way for immutable fses.  As
>> for current EROFS users, ComposeFS, containerd and Android APEXs will
>> be directly benefited from it.
>>
> Hi Gao,
> Thank you for the series! This is an interesting idea and will
> definitely help the Android ecosystem for APEXes if we can remove the
> loopback device. I will take a deeper look and provide comments soon.

Yes, I've seen no issue so far, and it will be submited for 6.12
since there are many users which really need this and wait for it.

Thanks,
Gao Xiang