(For all who would like to say that Linux file systems don’t require defragmenting: Please redirect your great ideas to the Ext4 developers. They are the authors of this program — I do not have anything in common with it. As it will turn out, Ext4 is indeed quite different than other Linux file systems. Thanks in advance for your understanding )

To begin playing with e4defrag we must start compile of new kernel with patches needed to carry out the defragmentation. Below you will find a short description of that process, and if you would not like to use all those experimental patches for Ext4, then you should be interested in these seven only:

ext4-online-defrag-exchange-blocks-between-two-inodes.patch
ext4-online-defrag-relocate-file-data.patch
ext4-online-defrag-alloc-contiguous-blks.patch
ext4-online-defrag-ext4-defrag.patch
ext4-online-defrag-for-relevant-files.patch
ext4-online-defrag-check-for-freespace-fragmentation.patch
ext4-online-defrag-move-victim-files.patch

In first step we start from creation of directory, grabbing the kernel source, and downloading and unpacking needed patches.

mkdir linux-2.6-ext4
cd linux-2.6-ext4/
ketchup -G 2.6-git
wget http://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/kernel/people/tytso/\\
ext4-patches/2.6.26-rc2-git5-ext4-1/broken-out.tar.bz2
tar xjvf broken-out.tar.bz2
mv broken-out patches

Then we apply the patches on the sources.

quilt push -a

Then we start a process of configuring/building our new system kernel.

cp /our/beloved/.config .
cp /our/beloved/script/for/building/system/kernel/build.sh .

(on my PC it look like this:)

#!/bin/sh 

VER=`ketchup -m` 

make
sudo make modules_install
sudo cp arch/x86/boot/bzImage /boot/vmlinuz-$VER
sudo cp System.map /boot/System.map-$VER
sudo /sbin/new-kernel-pkg --mkinitrd --depmod --install $VER
)
make oldconfig
./build.sh

Meanwhile, when our new kernel compiles, we may open file: linux-2.6-ext4/patches/ext4-online-defrag-command.patch in our text editor of choice and we delete all lines from 1 to 18, and then from 1932 to 1935. Then, we copy our source code to other location.

cp linux-2.6-ext4/patches/ext4-online-defrag-command.patch e4defrag.c

And compile…

gcc -Wall e4defrag.c -o e4defrag

It is worth to grab some tools to handle the Ext4 file systems (the very latest version from the code repository).

git-clone git://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/fs/ext2/e2fsprogs.git
cd e2fsprogs
./configure
make
make install

After running our system with brand new kernel for the first time, we can finally start to test e4defrag. First we create and mount a test file system.

dd if=/dev/zero of=fs.img bs=256M count=1
/sbin/mkfs.ext3 fs.img

Now we must allow the use of experimental code on that partition.

/sbin/debugfs -w fs.img
debugfs 1.41-WIP (27-Apr-2008)
debugfs:  set_super_value s_flags 4
debugfs:  quit

Now our new file system is ready to be mounted

mount -t ext4dev -o loop,extents fs.img /mnt/loop0/

How to cause fragmentation at Ext4? - I have not yet tested any good way for fast fragmenting Ext4. This file system contrary to other Linux file systems is exceptionally resistant to fragmentation.

 /sbin/fsck.ext3 -nfv fs.img
e2fsck 1.41-WIP (27-Apr-2008)
First  course: checking i-nodes, blocks and sizes
Second course: checking directory structure
Third  course: checking communications directories
Fourth course: checking counters appeals
Fifth  course: checking the summary information about groups

     368 inodes used (0.56%)
       1 non-contiguous inode (0.3%)
         number i-nodes with blocks ind/dind/tind: 136/129/129
  202885 blocks used (77.39%)
       0 bad blocks
       0 large files 

     351 regular files
       8 directories
       0 character device files
       0 block device files
       0 fifos
       0 links
       0 symbolic links (0 fast symbolic links)
       0 sockets
--------
     359 files

It seems that Ext4 is a tough row to hoe, but its developers still deliver a defragmentation tool for it. Take a peep!

With use e4defrag we can defrag single files, for example:

e4defrag /patch/to/file

or all directories:

e4defrag -r /patch/to/directory/

also, there is a way to defrag a partition:

e4defrag /dev/sda1
e4defrag file_system_image.img

E4defrag contrary to other solutions - Con Kolivas defrag or ok_defrag is a true professional program designed to defrag Ext file system — it does not use a simple tricks with moving files, but it checks where on a drive the free blocks are located and then moves the data into those places.

A user, who will be capable to fragment Ext4, surely will be satisfied with the results of e4defrag. I am fully satisfied with the Ext4, for now I have no need to run e4d or even ok_defrag :).