This is an ALPHA release of a new, rewritten e2fsck.  It is
significantly faster than the original e2fsck, particularily for systems
with large disks and a small buffer cache.  This is because the
algorithms used in the original e2fsck are inefficient, and requires
multiple rereading of various directory and inode blocks.  

This new e2fsck is based upon a ext2fs library which can be used by
other programs that need to access an ext2fs filesystem directly via the
device file, instead of through the kernel.

The debugfs program is a sample program which also uses the ext2fs
library.  In addition, it can be used by a user to manually fix (or
corrupt) an ext2fs.

For the moment, please only use it if you are prepared to manually
descramble your filesystem if e2fsck screws up.  It should be
relatively safe to use in "preen" mode (-p or -a), since it will abort
if it finds any really unusual situations.  You will then have to run
e2fsck on that partition by hand.

If you find any bugs, please send them to me (tytso@mit.edu).  Good luck!

					Theodore Ts'o
					6-Oct-93





