This topic describes the limits of Apsara File Storage NAS on service specifications, operating systems, protocols, and networks.

Limits on service specifications

ItemDescription
Maximum number of file systems that you can create within an Alibaba Cloud account in a single region
  • General-purpose NAS file system: 20
  • Extreme NAS file system: 200
Maximum number of mount targets for a single file system
  • General-purpose NAS file system: 2
  • Extreme NAS file system: 1
Maximum number of files in a single file system
  • General-purpose NAS file system: 1 billion
  • Extreme NAS file system: 500 million
Maximum number of directory levels in a single file system1,000 levels
Maximum capacity of a single file system
  • Capacity NAS file system: 10 PiB
  • Performance NAS file system: 1 PiB
  • Extreme NAS file system: 256 TiB
Maximum number of compute nodes on which you can mount a file system at the same time1,000
Maximum size of a single file32 TiB
Maximum number of hard links to a single file511
Maximum number of permission groups that you can create within an Alibaba Cloud account in a single region20
Maximum number of rules that you can create for a permission group300

Limits on operating systems

ItemDescription
ImageThe NAS product team has tested the kernel images and listed the recommended images for NAS. To ensure the optimal performance of NAS file systems, use the recommended kernel versions or later versions. If you do not use the recommended kernel images, NAS may become unavailable. For more information, see Recommended kernel images.
Kernel versionThe NAS product team has identified some defective kernel versions and provided solutions. If you use a defective kernel version and do not upgrade the version, NAS may become unavailable. If the NAS product team identifies new issues about the adaption of kernel versions, Alibaba Cloud pushes notifications to you by using emails, internal messages, text messages, and console announcements. Make sure that the preceding communication channels are available and handle the issues at the earliest opportunity. For more information, see Known issues on NFS clients.
macOSYou can mount only Server Message Block (SMB) file systems on macOS.
AIXNot supported.

Limits on protocols

Network File System (NFS) file systems

ItemDescription
Naming conventionsThe name of a file cannot exceed 255 bytes in length.
Protocol versionsOnly NFSv3 and NFSv4.0 are supported.
File featuresThe POSIX SetUID, SetGID, and sticky bits features are not supported.
NFSv4.0 attributesThe following attributes are not supported:
  • FATTR4_MIMETYPE
  • ATTR4_QUOTA_AVAIL_HARD
  • FATTR4_QUOTA_AVAIL_SOFT
  • FATTR4_QUOTA_USED
  • FATTR4_TIME_BACKUP
  • FATTR4_TIME_CREATE
  • FATTR4_ARCHIVE

If you use an unsupported attribute, an NFS4ERR_ATTRNOTSUPP error code is logged in the /var/log/messages file.

NFSv4.0 operationsThe following operations are not supported:
  • OP_DELEGPURGE
  • OP_DELEGRETURN
  • NFS4_OP_OPENATTR

If you call an unsupported operation, an NFS4ERR_ATTRNOTSUPP error code is logged in the /var/log/messages file.

NFSv4.0 featuresThe delegation feature is not supported.
UIDs and GIDs
  • In Linux, the mappings between user IDs (UIDs) and usernames and the mappings between group IDs (GIDs) and group names are defined in configuration files. For NFSv3 file systems, if the mapping between an ID and a name is defined in a configuration file, the name is used to represent the user or group. If no mapping is defined for an ID, the ID is used.
  • For NFSv4.0 file systems, if the version of the Linux kernel is earlier than 3.0, the usernames and group names of all files are identified as nobody. If the version of the Linux kernel is later than 3.0, the rule that is used by NFSv3 file systems applies.
    Note If the Linux kernel version is earlier than 3.0, we recommend that you do not run the chown or chgrp command for files or directories in an NFSv4.0 file system. Otherwise, the UID and GID of the file or directory are changed to nobody.
NFS clients
  • For General-purpose NAS file systems, an NFS client can send a maximum of 128 concurrent requests.
  • For General-purpose NAS file systems, the maximum bandwidth of an NFS client is 500 MB/s.
  • You can open a maximum of 32,768 files at a time on an NFS client. The files in the list folder and its subfolders are not counted.
  • Each mount on an NFS client can obtain up to 8,192 locks across a maximum of 256 file-process pairs. For example, a single process can obtain one or more locks on 256 separate files, or 8 processes can each obtain one or more locks on 32 files.
  • We recommend that you do not use an NFS client on an Elastic Compute Service (ECS) instance to access an NFS file system.
File and directory typesExtreme NAS file systems support the following types of files and directories: REG, DIR, SYMLINK, and LINK.

SMB file systems

ItemDescription
Naming conventionsThe name of a file cannot exceed 255 UTF-16 characters in length.
Features
  • SMB file systems do not support extended file attributes or lease-based client-side caching.
  • SMB file systems do not support I/O control (IOCTL) or file system control (FSCTL) operations. For example, you cannot create sparse files, compress files, check the status of network interface cards (NICs), or create reparse points.
  • SMB file systems do not support alternate data streams.
  • SMB file systems do not support identity authentication based on Lightweight Directory Access Protocol (LDAP).
  • SMB file systems do not support the following features: SMB Direct, SMB Multichannel, SMB Directory Leasing, and persistent file handles.
Protocol versionsSMB version 2.1 and later are supported.
SMB clientsEach file or directory can be opened by up to 8,192 users at a time. This limit applies across all compute nodes on which the file system is mounted and all users that share access to the file system. This indicates that each file or directory can have up to 8,192 active file handles. A file system can have a maximum of 65,536 active file handles.

Limits on networks

ItemDescription
Classic network
  • You cannot mount a NAS file system on an ECS instance that belongs to another Alibaba Cloud account.
  • If the IP address of a mount target is changed due to kernel limits, the NAS file system may become inaccessible.

    In this case, Alibaba Cloud pushes notifications to you by using emails, internal messages, text messages, intelligent voice reminders, and console announcements 30 days in advance. Remount the file system within 30 days after you receive the notifications.

Network of General-purpose NAS file systemsGeneral-purpose NAS file systems use the new-generation high-performance network transmission channel of Alibaba Cloud. This channel does not support custom TCP options. If you use custom TCP options, the NAS file system may fail to be mounted.

Limits on directory quotas

ItemDescription
File system typeOnly General-purpose NFS file systems support quota management.
QuotaFor a single file system, you can configure quotas for up to 500 directories. The maximum directory depth is eight levels. For example, the depth of the root directory / is zero level. The depth of the /workspace directory is one level. The depth of the /workspace/dir1 directory is two levels.