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Is any technical documentation available for Apple's new File System. By technical, I mean File System's internal structures, File allocation block etc. If Apple has not released any documentation, did someone tried to reverse engineer it?

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  • If Apple has not released any documentation, did someone tried to reverse engineer it? This is unclear. Reverse engineer it how? What are you trying to achieve?
    – Allan
    Feb 14, 2018 at 11:38
  • I am trying to write a recovery software for APFS. I need to know how this filesystem stores its files. How it manages its boot blocks, volume header, directory structure and file allocation.
    – mannan
    Feb 14, 2018 at 12:03
  • I am trying to find something like this for APFS: dubeiko.com/development/FileSystems/HFSPLUS/tn1150.html
    – mannan
    Feb 14, 2018 at 12:05

2 Answers 2

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Apple File System Developer Documentation

Apple File System is a new, modern file system for iOS, macOS, tvOS, and watchOS. It is optimized for Flash/SSD storage and features strong encryption, copy-on-write metadata, space sharing, cloning for files and directories, snapshots, fast directory sizing, atomic safe-save primitives, and improved file system fundamentals.

See also Apple's File System Programming Guide.

Additionally, this blog APFS – A Backup Software Developer’s Perspective makes mention of APFS already being reverse engineered.

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Apple has released documentation for APFS. It's a little sparse, but most of the critical information should be there.

https://developer.apple.com/support/apple-file-system/Apple-File-System-Reference.pdf

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