The System V file system contained four blocks – the boot block, super block, inode array and data
blocks. This was inefficient, because seek times would be massive – inodes are at the start of the disk
and the actual data could be anywhere from the start to the end! There was also only a single super
block (block containing attributes of the entire filesystem). If this was corrupted, it's bye-bye file system.
The Berkeley Fast Filesystem (and ext2) extended the System V filesystem by creating block groups –
all equally sized and each somewhat replicating the System V structure (aside from boot block). The
inode array was split into group descriptors, data block bitmap, inode bitmap and inode table. This
solves the major problems with s5fs, as proximity of inode tables and data blocks is spatial locality-
friendly, and you can no longer corrupt the entire filesystem by way of superblock.
Titany answered the question on April 26, 2022 at 11:45
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