macOS Tahoe brings a new disk image format

lucasoshiro wrote: post #4

Nice. But I would like it better if the effort was to support ext4, BtrFS, NTFS and other popular filesystems from the Linux and Windows world...

ext4 and Btrfs are only well supported on Linux; they are not universal standards.

NTFS was only supported well on Windows until recently; but extensions like NTFS Encryption (BitLocker) are still Windows only. Mac still does not let you write to an NTFS volume.

APFS and HFS+ are obviously Apple file systems.

FreeBSD does not support ext4 or Btrfs well; but instead prefers UFS2 or ZFS despite also being an open-source Unix-inspired OS.

The world runs on proprietary or non-universal file systems with CDFS (ISO 9660), FAT, and exFAT being the sole exceptions.

Re: macOS Tahoe brings a new disk image format

#7

Post by mrpippy » Thu, Jun 12, 2025, 4:58 PM UTC

lucasoshiro wrote: post #4

Nice. But I would like it better if the effort was to support ext4, BtrFS, NTFS and other popular filesystems from the Linux and Windows world...

Apple recently made FSKit a supported/documented API, which should allow third-parties to add support for other filesystems: https://developer.apple.com/documentation/fskit?language=obj...

Re: macOS Tahoe brings a new disk image format

#8

Post by nemomarx » Thu, Jun 12, 2025, 4:59 PM UTC

gjsman-1000 wrote: post #6

lucasoshiro wrote: post #4

Nice. But I would like it better if the effort was to support ext4, BtrFS, NTFS and other popular filesystems from the Linux and Windows world...

ext4 and Btrfs are only well supported on Linux; they are not universal standards. NTFS was only supported well on Windows until recently; but extensions like NTFS Encryption (BitLocker) are still Windows only. Mac still does not let you write to an NTFS volume. APFS and HFS+ are obviously Apple file systems. FreeBSD does not support ext4 or Btrfs well; but instead prefers UFS2 or ZFS despite also being an open-sourc…

if Mac also supported Linux file formats they would get closer to universal, though? we can't get to that world without these individual steps.

creating a new non universal one is backing away from it

Re: macOS Tahoe brings a new disk image format

#9

Post by gjsman-1000 » Thu, Jun 12, 2025, 5:00 PM UTC

nemomarx wrote: post #8

gjsman-1000 wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

ext4 and Btrfs are only well supported on Linux; they are not universal standards. NTFS was only supported well on Windows until recently; but extensions like NTFS Encryption (BitLocker) are still Windows only. Mac still does not let you write to an NTFS volume. APFS and HFS+ are obviously Apple file systems. FreeBSD does not support ext4 or Btrfs well; but instead prefers UFS2 or ZFS despite also being an open-sourc…

if Mac also supported Linux file formats they would get closer to universal, though? we can't get to that world without these individual steps. creating a new non universal one is backing away from it

Even FreeBSD can't be bothered to do a good job supporting Linux file systems. They're basically proprietary siloed file systems like the rest, even if code is available. Linux, meanwhile, can't be bothered to support either of FreeBSD's file systems officially. UFS2 is hardly patented anymore, but Linux doesn't care beyond read-only support.

Being open-source, and even being in a popular open-source project, does not make a standard, or even imply inferiority to those who do not implement it.

https://xkcd.com/927/

Re: macOS Tahoe brings a new disk image format

#10

Post by jraph » Thu, Jun 12, 2025, 5:04 PM UTC

lucasoshiro wrote: post #4

Nice. But I would like it better if the effort was to support ext4, BtrFS, NTFS and other popular filesystems from the Linux and Windows world...

This article describes a new disk image format (on which a filesystem can be put, APFS in the article), not a filesystem, or did I misunderstand?

edit: added the word "image", which I apparently forgot to type. Mentioning the edition because otherwise it would make an answer to this comment difficult to understand.