Understanding default quotas

About default quotas

You can create a default quota for users, groups, or qtrees. A default quota applies to quota targets that are not explicitly referenced in the /etc/quotas file. You create default quotas by using an asterisk (*) in the Quota Target field in the /etc/quota file. For more information about creating default quotas, see Fields of the /etc/quotas file and Tracking quota examples.

How to override a default quota

If you do not want Data ONTAP to apply a default quota to a particular target, you can create an entry in the /etc/quotas file for that target. The explicit quota for that target overrides the default quota.

Where default quotas are applied

You apply a default user or group quota on a per-volume or per-qtree basis.

You apply a default tree quota on a per-volume basis. For example, you can specify that a default tree quota be applied to the cad volume, which means that all qtrees created in the cad volume are subject to this quota but that qtrees in other volumes are unaffected.

Typical default quota usage

As an example, suppose you want a user quota to be applied to most users of your system. Rather than applying that quota individually to every user, you can create a default user quota that will be automatically applied to every user. If you want to change that quota for a particular user, you can override the default quota for that user by creating an entry for that user in the /etc/quotas file.

For an example of a default quota, see Tracking quota examples.

About default tracking quotas

If you do not want to specify a default user, group or tree quota limit, you can specify default tracking quotas. These special default quotas do not enforce any resource limits, but they enable you to resize rather than reinitialize quotas after adding or deleting quota file entries.