EFS concepts

Morph EFS means Morph Ephemeral File System. It provides named filesystems that can be mounted into a supported Linux environment and used through ordinary file operations.

The important product boundary is simple: EFS is a filesystem surface. You create a filesystem, mount it to a path on a supported host, read and write files through that path, unmount it, and delete it when it is no longer needed.

Morph handles mount setup behind the CLI. You should not need implementation-specific settings for normal EFS workflows.

Core concepts

Concept	What it means
Filesystem	The durable EFS identity you create by name. This is the thing you mount, inspect, use, and eventually delete.
Mount	A connection between an EFS filesystem and a path on a supported Linux host.
Mount path	The path where the filesystem appears on the machine running the mount command.
Active mount	A signal that a filesystem is currently mounted and in use.
TTL	An optional cleanup boundary for temporary filesystems or mounts.
Usage	Sampled storage usage and active mount visibility for a filesystem.
Cleanup	The service-side cleanup that finishes after unmount, delete, or TTL expiry.

Filesystems

An EFS filesystem is the named storage resource you create and later mount.

morphcloud efs create shared-files
morphcloud efs get shared-files
morphcloud efs ls

A filesystem has a Morph-generated id, a user-provided name, lifecycle state, optional TTL, creation time, and active mount count.

Mounts

A mount gives you a filesystem path for an EFS filesystem. The CLI requests access to the filesystem and returns when the mount path is ready.

morphcloud efs mount shared-files

By default, morphcloud efs mount <filesystem> mounts at ~/morph-efs/<filesystem>. To choose a path, pass it explicitly:

morphcloud efs mount shared-files /tmp/shared-files

After the path is ready, use normal Linux file operations. Flush writes with sync before reading them from another process or host:

echo hello > ~/morph-efs/shared-files/test.txt
sync
cat ~/morph-efs/shared-files/test.txt

Unmount with the filesystem name or id. Unmounting ends the active mount:

morphcloud efs unmount shared-files

See Mount requirements for the Linux and FUSE prerequisites a host must meet.

Shared mounts

The same EFS filesystem can be mounted from more than one supported host in the same Morph context. Each host gets its own mount path; the shared storage identity is the EFS filesystem name or id, not the machine or mount path.

A file written through one mount can be read through another once the write is flushed. For concurrent writers, coordinate at the application level — avoid having two processes overwrite the same file at the same time unless your application has a clear locking or atomic-write pattern.

Lifecycle

A typical EFS lifecycle is:

1. Create a filesystem with morphcloud efs create.
2. Inspect it with morphcloud efs get, morphcloud efs ls, or the TUI and dashboard.
3. Mount it with morphcloud efs mount, which returns when the mount path is ready.
4. Read and write through the mounted path.
5. Unmount it with morphcloud efs unmount, which ends the active mount.
6. Delete it with morphcloud efs delete when it is no longer needed. Delete marks the filesystem for cleanup; cleanup finishes asynchronously after active mounts no longer block it.

If you set a TTL at create or mount time, treat it as a cleanup boundary for temporary workflows. For durable workflows, use explicit lifecycle commands and delete only after the filesystem is no longer needed.

Usage and billing

EFS tracks active mounts and sampled bytes used:

morphcloud efs usage shared-files

Where EFS billing is enabled, storage pricing and filesystem quotas depend on the active Morph account or organization plan. See Usage and billing for the current EFS plan table and usage fields.

Interactive tools

Beyond the raw CLI, EFS offers two interactive surfaces — a terminal TUI and a browser dashboard — for inspecting filesystems, watching mount status, and browsing files. See TUI and dashboard.