Why Linux Does Need To Defrag (Sometimes)
It’s very common that you’ll hear “Linux doesn’t fragment.” This is kinda true, Linux definitely doesn’t fragment too much. Not as much as NTFS and not even close to as much as FAT.
NTFS has made big improvements and EXT4 is definitely great, but there are absolutely cases where you may need to defrag linux.
Thankfully there is a tool for this. e4defrag, and here’s a little “how to defrag linux” tutorial.
e4defrag
e4defrag is a tool that should be included in your distro, and is definitely included in Ubuntu 12.04. It is a very easy to use tool that will defrag your partition. And, as a plus, it’s made by the ext4 developers, so you’re in good hands.
When To Use It
Typically you really don’t need to defrag, people aren’t totally off base when they say this. But if you’ve been deleting a ton of files and then adding a ton of files and really filling up large amounts of space on your drive you might want to defrag.
How To Use It
It’s really simple to use.
You can defrag all partitions by simply typing:
sudo e4defrag /dev/*
Or you can single one out like
‘sudo e4defrag /dev/sda6’
or
‘sudo e4defrag /dev/sda*’
I think it’s nice that there finally exists a mainstream defrag tool that’s so easy to use. It may not be necessary for the average user but it’s nice that it’s there.
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