Ignition 8.3 - ignition/var/data to /shm (RAM)

Ignition
1

Background:

Host: Ubuntu 24.04.3 running Ignition 8.3 gateway with Perspective as target.

We have a relatively data intensive application with a database written to both by Ignition and a separate application. We have been tuning the relationship with the database, as we’ve experience high write cycles on our SSD, largely due to the external application (which we are mitigating through changes).

Question:

One of our engineers recommended moving ignition/data/var to /shm (RAM storage, I’m not a Linux guru) to reduce write operations to disk from Ignition. I’m looking for any feedback from Ignition experts on if this is a NASA Challenger-level bad idea or okay. As I understand it, the biggest issue is volatility on power cycle, so certain loss of data on power up, but I am most concerned with the Ignition application starting properly and running.

Thank you. Disclaimer: I’m dumb.

2

Make a new mount point with a tmpfs (/shm collision would worry me.)

Move your database's tablespace to this mount point, and use DB-specific settings to mark it transient. (MEMORY storage engine in MariaDB, for example.)

(Your database shouldn't be in the same server as Ignition, anyways.)

3

Do you have some evidence that $IGNITION/var/data is even seeing a lot of writes?

Anyway, I wouldn't do it. It's not a temp directory.

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