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December 30, 1999
Web posted at: 1:43 p.m. EST (1843 GMT)

by Douglas F. Gray

BERLIN (IDG) -- It's not every day that a group of people come together to work towards a goal that they never plan on reaching, but Hans Reiser formed his company on that very concept.

Reiser's firm, the Naming System Venture, more commonly known by the abbreviation Namesys aims at creating a quicker and easier way to search file databases on Linux-based systems. Even though he dubs this ultimate achievement "the Holy Grail," both MP3.com and SuSE are already investing in Reiser's company.

"Currently, file systems can't do what a keyword search system or a database system can do. We can't do that either," Reiser told IDG News Service in an interview here at hacker group Chaos Computer Club's 16th Chaos Communication Congress. "But by trying, we expect to see things snowball in functionality," he added.

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Reiser bases his system of file structure organization, called ReiserFS, on a complicated system involving the way data for files is organized. When home PC users look at a list of files in their directory, they usually don't even think of the process behind the searching for that list, but when companies search through a huge amount of information, time and efficiency become much more important issues, he said.

The method of searching for these objects is called the "namespace," which contains all the vital statistics for each file, and Reiser's "impossible dream," is "namespace unity." He refers to namespaces as the roads and waterways of computer operating systems design. In this analogy, namespace unity would mean everyone being able to take the same route to work.

"Namespace unity will never happen," Reiser said. "Despite never reaching it, attempting to do it is worthwhile."

Since Namesys may never achieve namespace unity, why is the organization, a group of nine Russian programmers and two Americans, already receiving "a few tens of thousands of dollars" in financing from SuSE and MP3.com? "We are fast and we are in the Linux market," is Reiser's reply.

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With SuSE, a Linux distributor, the connection is obvious, but MP3.com's interest in Linux-based ReiserFS is less clear-cut.

In terms of the MP3 search engine, MP3.com spends millions of U.S. dollars on file servers, as well as bringing in a new network appliance every month, Reiser said. "They have figured out that for a fraction of the cost of buying new hardware, they can sponsor us to find a solution in open source," he said. "MP3.com would like to move to Linux, but can't because the necessary features aren't there yet."

Reiser is keen to broaden the appeal of ReiserFS away from being solely based on Linux. He wants the utility to be available on all PCs, most of which run Microsoft's Windows family of operating systems. The problem however is that Microsoft already has native file systems built into its operating systems which users can't alter, Reiser said. In particular, he mentioned Rational Software's Windows-compatible file system ClearCase.

Due to the file system situation, Reiser took Microsoft to court the week before the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) kicked off its initial antitrust action against the software giant in October of 1997. Reiser's argument in his lawsuit was that Microsoft has denied Namesys access to the central facilities, the source code, necessary for him to provide a source code patch. Microsoft unsuccessfully moved to have his case thrown out of court.

"The DOJ is arguing with Microsoft over whether the browser is part of the operating system, this is inherently the wrong question," Reiser said.

He compared buying the Windows operating system to buying a new car. "What Microsoft does is like putting a combination lock on every door on the car as well as on the latch to the hood. I'm not arguing that the car should be free, I'm arguing that the lock should come off," he said.

Reiser wouldn't reveal how much his legal battle, which is currently before the U.S. Court of Appeals, had cost him, only quipping that he had "not spent quite as much as the DOJ."

Douglas F. Gray writes for the IDG News Service.