Inside the Windows NT file system
The NT File System (NTFS) is a new file system with advanced capabilities, created specifically for use with the Microsoft Windows NT operating system. In this book Helen Custer, author of the bestselling Inside Windows NT, provides an inside look at the design of the unique new file system.
Stats for nerds
1recommend
5mentions
2people
2018–2026years
20% recommend80% neutral
Mentions per year
What Hacker News says
- Yes, won't be that quite in depth given no source code, but you can easily look up the NT4 source code on GitHub if you want to dive that deep. I would assume much of that code should still be relevant today.
Also worth tracking down a copy of the NT OS/2 Design Workbook on the web (another leak).
And Inside the Windows NT File System by Helen Custer is a very short book but describes the very early state of NTFS capabilities/functions.
- NTFS uses atomic transactions, that's the only way it has the ability to recover after a fault.
You can read more if you wish in 'Inside the Windows NT File System' by Helen Custer, page 15.
- Got a copy sitting right next to me! Along with Inside The Windows NT File System (and The Design and Implementation of the 4.4 BSD Operating System).
'Windows Internals' series is the successor to Inside Windows NT.
- > I want to study Win NT
Windows NT Design Workbook:
https://computernewb.com/~lily/files/Documents/NTDesignWorkb...
Tale of Two Kernels:
And I'm sure you've picked up a copy of Windows Internals. Right now I'm waiting for a copy of Inside Windows NT which is the first edition of that series as well as Inside the Windows NT File System, both by Helen Custer.
- Around 1996/97 I heard two very similar rumors, from two people who did not know each other. Both rumors had it that the NT source at that time was at least in some part the source of "Micah", the OS that Dave Cutler and crew had been working on for the Prism architecture. The NT source still had DEC copyrights and mentions of Micah in it. That's why DEC had such a weird deal with Microsoft, and why there was an Alpha AXP port of NT long after all other architectures went by the wayside.
As far as credibility of this rumor, if you have a copy of "Inside the Windows NT file system" (https://www.amazon.com/Inside-Windows-NT-File-System/dp/1556...) by Helen Custer, you'll see a more than passing resemblance of NTFS to ODS-2, the on-disk layout of VMS filesystem. G. Pascal Zachary has a big chapter on the development of NTFS, if I recall "Showstopper!" correctly, but he doesn't mention this... coincidence at all, giving full credit for NTFS to a couple of guys on the NT team.
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