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[nfs-utils.git] / utils / exportfs / exports.man

diff --git a/utils/exportfs/exports.man b/utils/exportfs/exports.man
index 5dcc809361d6002df79eb3f76b0f43392116b832..7ab7640da1350b8f8b6733c007135fb13d639abe 100644 (file)
--- a/utils/exportfs/exports.man
+++ b/utils/exportfs/exports.man
@@ -45,9 +45,10 @@ parts or those containing a single dash (\-) are ignored.
 .IP "wildcards
 Machine names may contain the wildcard characters \fI*\fR and \fI?\fR.
 This can be used to make the \fIexports\fR file more compact; for instance,
-\fI*.cs.foo.edu\fR matches all hosts in the domain \fIcs.foo.edu\fR. However,
-these wildcard characters do not match the dots in a domain name, so the
-above pattern does not include hosts such as \fIa.b.cs.foo.edu\fR.
+\fI*.cs.foo.edu\fR matches all hosts in the domain
+\fIcs.foo.edu\fR.  As these characters also match the dots in a domain
+name, the given pattern will also match all hosts within any subdomain
+of \fIcs.foo.edu\fR.
 .IP "IP networks
 You can also export directories to all hosts on an IP (sub-) network
 simultaneously. This is done by specifying an IP address and netmask pair
@@ -95,17 +96,31 @@ This can also be made explicit by using
 the
 .IR ro " option.
 .TP
-.IR sync
-This option requests that all file writes be committed to disc before
-the write request completes.  This is required for complete safety of
-data in the face of a server crash, but incurs a performance hit.
-The default is to allow the server to write the data out whenever it
-is ready.  This can be explicitly requested with the
-.IR async " option.
+.IR async
+This option allows the NFS server to violate the NFS protocol and
+reply to requests before any changes made by that request have been
+committed to stable storage (e.g. disc drive).
+
+Using this option usually improves performance, but at the cost that
+an unclean server restart (i.e. a crash) can cause data to be lost or
+corrupted.
+
+In releases of nfs-utils upto and including 1.0.0, this option was the
+default.  In this and future releases,
+.I sync
+is the default, and
+.I async
+must be explicit requested if needed.
+To help make system adminstrators aware of this change, 'exportfs'
+will issue a warning if neither
+.I sync
+nor
+.I async
+is specified.
 .TP
 .IR no_wdelay
-This option only has effect if
-.I sync
+This option has no effect if
+.I async
 is also set.  The NFS server will normally delay committing a write request
 to disc slightly if it suspects that another related write request may be in
 progress or may arrive soon.  This allows multiple write requests to