storage-stack-discussion.md was misplaced at the docs root — that level is
for track plans; this is the file-system domain's design record. Moved to
file-system-development/storage-design-rationale.md, renamed to say what it
is, cross-references updated.
The NVMe/SATA assessment folded into the storage discussion: what transfers
untouched (the block contract and everything above it — one driver binary
plus one devices.csv row per transport), NVMe as the shorter stack whose
namespaces are the reserved multi-volume case, AHCI as an open shape choice
(leaning per-port processes, the matrix-proven granularity), and the three
pressure points named honestly: multi-volume is reserved-not-implemented,
synchronous call/reply bottlenecks NVMe until the shm-ring data plane, and
media lifecycle is not device lifecycle.
That last one becomes decision 7 and enters the architecture doc: the
removal path has TWO TRIGGERS, ONE LIFECYCLE — channel death (device leaves)
and a planned pushed medium_changed event (medium leaves, device stays: card
readers and trays, USB ones today), translated by the storage driver from
its transport's native signal, presence never content, consumed by the
volume manager into the same kill-retire-remount path. Without it a swapped
card would be served with the previous card's filesystem state.
The enforcement section of the storage architecture: the three levers the
device lifecycle already proved, mapped onto volumes — a filesystem can only
be GIVEN its volume (no establishment grants, channel at spawn), the volume
manager supervises with teeth (deadline, kill-on-removal, crash-loop cap),
and the shared harness makes every engine inherit the state machine by
construction (engines never see channels). Kernel backstops: ownership-gated
fs_unmount + the lazy dead-endpoint sweep. Checkable via a lifecycle
conformance drill parameterized over filesystems — supporting a filesystem
MEANS passing it.
The settled shape from the storage-stack discussion, written as the
reference: the data path (vfs -> filesystem service -> block -> driver) as
the application/service/protocol/driver model applied twice; the three kinds
of boundary (protocol between processes, library inside them, control-plane
beside them); the volume manager as the policy home (planned — the FAT
service squats on its duties today, marked as such); adding a filesystem as
engine + shared harness + one configuration row; and the per-layer
responsibility table for removable media — one removal path, kill/retire/
respawn, dirty data lost and SAID to be lost. Indexed from docs/README.md.
Daniel Samson