Help Center/ Scalable File Service/ User Guide/ General-Purpose File System Management/ Creating a General-Purpose File System
Updated on 2025-12-10 GMT+08:00
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Creating a General-Purpose File System

You can create a general-purpose file system and mount it to multiple cloud servers. The servers can then share this file system.

Prerequisites

  1. A VPC is available.

    If no VPC is available, create one by referring to Creating a VPC with a Subnet in the Virtual Private Cloud User Guide.

  2. ECSs are available and they are in the created VPC.

    If no ECSs are available, buy ECSs by referring to Purchasing and Using an ECS and Logging in to an ECS.

Creating a General-Purpose File System

  1. Log in to the SFS console.
  2. In the upper right corner of the page, click Create File System.
  3. Set the parameters shown in Figure 1. Table 1 describes the parameters.

    Figure 1 Creating a general-purpose file system
    Table 1 General-purpose file system parameters

    Parameter

    Description

    Replicate Existing File System Settings

    Optional. Click Select Source File System. On the displayed page, select a source general-purpose file system from the list. After you click OK, the system automatically copies the region, AZ, protocol, authorization, and tags of the source file system.

    You can change some or all of the replicated settings, if needed.

    Region

    Mandatory

    The region of the tenant. Select a region from the drop-down list in the upper left corner of the page.

    Select the region where the cloud servers and VPC endpoint reside.

    AZ

    A geographical area with an independent network and an independent power supply.

    You are advised to select the AZ where the cloud servers reside.

    Name

    The user-defined name of the general-purpose file system. It cannot be changed after the general-purpose file system is created. Set an appropriate name when creating the file system.

    In SFS, general-purpose file systems are named according to the globally applied DNS naming rules:

    • The name of a general-purpose file system must be globally unique. It cannot be the same as the name of any existing general-purpose file system, including one created by the current user or any other user. You must wait at least 30 minutes before you can reuse the name of a deleted general-purpose file system.
    • The name must be 3 to 63 characters long. Only lowercase letters, digits, hyphens (-), and periods (.) are allowed.
    • The name cannot start or end with a period (.) or hyphen (-), and cannot contain two consecutive periods (..) or contain a period (.) and a hyphen (-) adjacent to each other.
    • The name cannot be an IP address.
      NOTE:

      When you use virtual-hosted-style URLs to access SFS over HTTPS, if the general-purpose file system name contains periods (.), the certificate verification will fail. In this case, you are advised not to use periods (.) in file system names.

    Protocol Type

    General-purpose file systems support file access using NFS (NFSv3 only).

    Authorization

    You can select By VPC or By replication.

    By VPC: Select the VPC where the ECSs and VPC endpoint reside. An ECS cannot access a file system in a different VPC. Select the VPC where your ECSs reside. You can add VPCs later on the file system details page.

    By replication: This option is available after you select to replicate settings from a source file system. If you select authorization by replication, you can go to the source file system's details page to view the replicated permissions.

    VPC

    If you select authorization by VPC, you need to manually select a VPC.

    Select the IAM project to which the target VPC belongs and then select the target VPC. For details about IAM projects, see Project Management.

    Select the VPC where the ECSs and VPC endpoint reside. An ECS cannot access a general-purpose file system in a different VPC. Select the VPC where your ECSs reside. You can add VPCs later on the file system details page.

    Tag

    Optional

    When creating a general-purpose file system, you can add tags to it. Tags help you identify file systems, and you can classify and search for file systems by tag.

    A tag is composed of a key-value pair.
    • Key: mandatory. A tag key can contain a maximum of 128 characters. It can contain letters, digits, and spaces representable in UTF-8 and special characters (_.:=+-@). It cannot start or end with a space and cannot be left empty. Tag keys starting with _sys_ are system tags, and you cannot start a tag key with _sys_.
    • Value: optional. A tag value can contain a maximum of 255 characters. It can contain letters, digits, and spaces representable in UTF-8 and special characters (_.:=+-@) and can be left empty. It cannot start or end with a space.
    NOTICE:
    • You can add a maximum of 20 tags to a general-purpose file system.
    • Tag keys of the same general-purpose file system must be unique.
    • Except for tagging the general-purpose file system during file system creation, you can also add, modify, or delete tags for existing general-purpose file systems.

    Purchase Resource Packages

    Optional

    You can select this parameter and buy desired resource packages. The packages take effect immediately after payment. For more information, see Resource Packages in the Scalable File Service Billing.

    NOTICE:

    A resource package can only be used to pay for the storage used by general-purpose file systems in the same region. Any usage in excess of the package quota will be billed in the pay-per-use mode.

    Only available in the CN-Hong Kong region.

  4. Click Create Now.
  5. Confirm the file system information and click Submit.
  6. Go back to the file system list.

    If you can see the general-purpose file system in the list, it is created successfully. If not, the creation fails. Submit a service ticket for technical consultation.

    Figure 2 General-purpose file system created