s3fs
s3fs allows Linux, macOS, and FreeBSD to mount an S3 bucket via FUSE.
s3fs preserves the native object format for files, allowing use of other
tools like AWS CLI.
Features
- large subset of POSIX including reading/writing files, directories, symlinks, mode, uid/gid, and extended attributes
- compatible with Amazon S3, and other S3-based object stores
- allows random writes and appends
- large files via multi-part upload
- renames via server-side copy
- optional server-side encryption
- data integrity via MD5 hashes
- in-memory metadata caching
- local disk data caching
- user-specified regions, including Amazon GovCloud
- authenticate via v2 or v4 signatures
Installation
Many systems provide pre-built packages:
-
Amazon Linux via EPEL:
sudo amazon-linux-extras install epel sudo yum install s3fs-fuse -
Arch Linux:
sudo pacman -S s3fs-fuse -
Debian 9 and Ubuntu 16.04 or newer:
sudo apt install s3fs -
Fedora 27 or newer:
sudo dnf install s3fs-fuse -
Gentoo:
sudo emerge net-fs/s3fs -
RHEL and CentOS 7 or newer via EPEL:
sudo yum install epel-release sudo yum install s3fs-fuse -
SUSE 12 and openSUSE 42.1 or newer:
sudo zypper install s3fs -
macOS via Homebrew:
brew install --cask osxfuse brew install s3fs -
FreeBSD:
pkg install fusefs-s3fs
Note: Homebrew has deprecated osxfuse and s3fs may not install any more, see #1618.
Otherwise consult the compilation instructions.
Examples
s3fs supports the standard
AWS credentials file
stored in ${HOME}/.aws/credentials. Alternatively, s3fs supports a custom passwd file.
The default location for the s3fs password file can be created:
- using a
.passwd-s3fsfile in the users home directory (i.e.${HOME}/.passwd-s3fs) - using the system-wide
/etc/passwd-s3fsfile
Enter your credentials in a file ${HOME}/.passwd-s3fs and set
owner-only permissions:
echo ACCESS_KEY_ID:SECRET_ACCESS_KEY > ${HOME}/.passwd-s3fs
chmod 600 ${HOME}/.passwd-s3fs
Run s3fs with an existing bucket mybucket and directory /path/to/mountpoint:
s3fs mybucket /path/to/mountpoint -o passwd_file=${HOME}/.passwd-s3fs
If you encounter any errors, enable debug output:
s3fs mybucket /path/to/mountpoint -o passwd_file=${HOME}/.passwd-s3fs -o dbglevel=info -f -o curldbg
You can also mount on boot by entering the following line to /etc/fstab:
mybucket /path/to/mountpoint fuse.s3fs _netdev,allow_other 0 0
If you use s3fs with a non-Amazon S3 implementation, specify the URL and path-style requests:
s3fs mybucket /path/to/mountpoint -o passwd_file=${HOME}/.passwd-s3fs -o url=https://url.to.s3/ -o use_path_request_style
or(fstab)
mybucket /path/to/mountpoint fuse.s3fs _netdev,allow_other,use_path_request_style,url=https://url.to.s3/ 0 0
Note: You may also want to create the global credential file first
echo ACCESS_KEY_ID:SECRET_ACCESS_KEY > /etc/passwd-s3fs
chmod 600 /etc/passwd-s3fs
Note2: You may also need to make sure netfs service is start on boot
Limitations
Generally S3 cannot offer the same performance or semantics as a local file system. More specifically:
- random writes or appends to files require rewriting the entire object, optimized with multi-part upload copy
- metadata operations such as listing directories have poor performance due to network latency
- non-AWS providers may have eventual consistency so reads can temporarily yield stale data (AWS offers read-after-write consistency since Dec 2020)
- no atomic renames of files or directories
- no coordination between multiple clients mounting the same bucket
- no hard links
- inotify detects only local modifications, not external ones by other clients or tools
References
- goofys - similar to s3fs but has better performance and less POSIX compatibility
- s3backer - mount an S3 bucket as a single file
- S3Proxy - combine with s3fs to mount Backblaze B2, EMC Atmos, Microsoft Azure, and OpenStack Swift buckets
- s3ql - similar to s3fs but uses its own object format
- YAS3FS - similar to s3fs but uses SNS to allow multiple clients to mount a bucket
Frequently Asked Questions
License
Copyright (C) 2010 Randy Rizun [email protected]
Licensed under the GNU GPL version 2