[HN Gopher] pfs - A data-free filesystem
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       pfs - A data-free filesystem
        
       Author : tosh
       Score  : 80 points
       Date   : 2021-09-29 20:30 UTC (2 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (github.com)
 (TXT) w3m dump (github.com)
        
       | redconfetti wrote:
       | I wonder if this concept can be used for Pcoin.
        
       | pastrami_panda wrote:
       | Love it, the tone of the readme is amazing.
        
       | open-paren wrote:
       | Previous discussions
       | 
       | PiFS - The Data-Free Filesystem (February 20, 2021 -- 1 points, 1
       | comments) - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26208704
       | 
       | Pfs: Never worry about data again (October 25, 2019 -- 3 points,
       | 1 comments) - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21359338
       | 
       | The p Filesystem for FUSE: Store Your Data in p (February 21,
       | 2019 -- 1 points, 1 comments) -
       | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19223032
       | 
       | pifs - Avoid disk space usage by saving your files in the digits
       | of Pi (December 14, 2018 -- 3 points, 1 comments) -
       | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18687275
       | 
       | pfs - A data-free filesystem (March 14, 2017 -- 285 points, 105
       | comments) - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13869691
       | 
       | Pfs: Stores your data in p (January 6, 2016 -- 2 points, 1
       | comments) - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10856108
       | 
       | Pfs: Never worry about data again (January 5, 2016 -- 5 points, 1
       | comments) - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10847693
        
       | gfodor wrote:
       | I wonder how hard it would be to find offsets into pi that
       | contain surprisingly legit bit sequences.
        
         | nickdothutton wrote:
         | This. Given a few millions digits I wonder what the hit rate
         | is.
        
           | MauranKilom wrote:
           | Assuming your data is much shorter than the number of digits
           | to search, and that repeated digits do not appear often
           | enough to matter, the hit rate is just pow(10,
           | numberOfDigitsInData) / numberOfDigitsToSearch. Same idea for
           | any other base (if you then count digits of that base, not
           | base 10 digits of course).
           | 
           | That is, odds of finding a 6 digit datum in a million digits
           | are fairly good. Finding longer data becomes exceedingly
           | unlikely very fast.
        
       | [deleted]
        
       | netflixandkill wrote:
       | I love that they ran with this far enough to get it working. We
       | need a graph of the average number of bits to store an offset
       | into pi versus size of stored data.
        
         | floren wrote:
         | Well, based on this sentence:
         | 
         | > In this implementation, to maximise performance, we consider
         | each individual byte of the file separately, and look it up in
         | p.
         | 
         | I'd say best-case scenario, you're looking at 1:1 offset
         | storage size vs. stored data size :)
        
           | k__ wrote:
           | How would the location search slow down with inceased block
           | size?
           | 
           | And is the algorithm to do so faster on a quantum computer?
        
         | [deleted]
        
       | einpoklum wrote:
       | The last commit was made 5 years ago.
        
         | tmountain wrote:
         | I doubt Pi has changed much...
        
           | pindab0ter wrote:
           | To be fair, this is Hacker _News_.
        
       | [deleted]
        
       | noxer wrote:
       | Wait until people find out all the CSAM is stored on there. They
       | can't ban p soon enough. Its worse than bitcoin. /s
        
       | betwixthewires wrote:
       | This is seriously a very interesting concept. Sounds like tower
       | of babel but somehow much more useful for it's obvious purpose.
        
         | generalizations wrote:
         | Do you mean the library of babel?
        
           | wizzwizz4 wrote:
           | No, the Tower of Babel.[0] With this revolutionary
           | technology, we can keep track of information using only
           | metadata; in the information age, such a "digital Tower of
           | Babel" could let us attain ever-increasing heights of
           | Knowledge, if we are not scattered as a result.
           | 
           | [0]: https://xkcd.com/496/
        
             | MauranKilom wrote:
             | I don't get how the internet secretary thing relates to the
             | tower of babel... Did you mean https://xkcd.com/2421/?
        
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       (page generated 2021-09-29 23:02 UTC)