May 2026 Progress Report
What progress was made on your grant this month?
sia-vfs, a virtual file system layer that presents a POSIX-like interface (local-first operation with eventual consistency).- The planned core functionality of the VFS layer has been achieved. Some “plumbing” around file creation and modification will be added shortly.
- The current approach allows for adding advanced features such as snapshots and branching in the future - surpassing the original proposal.
Detail tasks worked on this month per milestone with the appropriate Pull Request(s) links as outlined in the guide:
| Milestone | Task | Pull Request(s) | Additional Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Milestone 2 | 1. Chunk & Blob support | Core chunk & blob types for sia-vfs · Pull Request #7 · rrauch/sia_nfs · GitHub | BlobReader & BlobWriter allow random access |
| 2. VFS API | Main VFS API & types · Pull Request #8 · rrauch/sia_nfs · GitHub | ||
| 3. Database backend | Database-backed persistence layer · Pull Request #9 · rrauch/sia_nfs · GitHub | embedded SQLite with comprehensive schema |
|
| 4. Data serialization | Zero-copy data serialization · Pull Request #10 · rrauch/sia_nfs · GitHub | FlatBuffers backed; zero-copy; for local and remote data |
|
| 5. Caching | In-memory caches for path and inode lookups · Pull Request #11 · rrauch/sia_nfs · GitHub | for Inode retrieval and Path lookups |
Summarize any problems that you ran into this month and how you’ll be solving them.
I lost several days of work attempting to use a graph database instead of a relational one. The graph-db approach did not work out, so I discarded that work and went with SQLite plus a strict schema instead. This works very well, and I have almost fully made up the lost time. A few finishing touches are therefore still outstanding.
Please note: I have not yet rebranded the project (as discussed above). This will happen next month.
What will you be working on next month?
- Finishing touches on the VFS layer
- Milestone 3
- Rebranding the project