ZFS ancestor : NetApp WAFL
When you want to learn how great ZFS will be, you have got many places to go. If you want to find out how it is working, well, it is not that obvious ( which is understandable, knowing that the product is not yet in the Solaris software express program, but still, it is annoying !).
That is why I was happy to read that there is a good document about ZFS design. Dated from 1994…
ZFS is actually using many design choices of the WAFL ( stands for Write Anywhere File Layout) technology developed by Network Appliances for use in their Network Attached Storage products.
So if you to know more about ZFS, go to the document.