discuss: Partition HOWTO, first part: Definition-and-naming
Subject:
Re: Partition HOWTO, first part: Definition-and-naming
From:
jdd ####@####.####
Date:
11 Mar 2009 09:12:50 +0000
Message-Id: <gp7v2c$4k3$1@ger.gmane.org>
Borden Rhodes a écrit :
> 'Mass storage devices involved here' should be the first topic
right - done.
> The section on disk geometry should start with bytes
byte have no meaning when disk is involved. There is no way to write
only bytes on a disk. I recently followed a thread where an iso image
was built in a file and then burned to a dvd. The file system was done
with 512 bytes sector and was perfecltly usable on the hard drive, but
once the iso image was burned on the dvd it was no more usable. The
user had to give a 2kiB sector size (the one dvd is done for) to get a
workable image. So the sector is the smaller unit on a drive.
> heads, cylinders, and then sectors.
I've seen interest in using cylinder fitted partitionning, but not
plate fitted. I don't want to go into the LBA discussion (or may I do?
if the HCL is wrong the drive is unusable)
> Moving along, I would put File Systems under its own heading.
The file system itself is not relevant for the partitionning, any
(mostly) partition can receive any file system. I added a link to
Wikipedia. This is only a definition page, I will give example of
making a file system later.
> Systems in its own section will make inodes easier to introduce later.
I will try *not* to introduce inodes. I try to give all what is
necessary to manage partion, no more. Of course it's not easy :-)
>
> Also after a few readings of the brief discussion of File Systems, I
> could be led to believe that a file system could be created without a
> partition to live in!
that's true. Most usb keys are not partitionned and this is perfectly
safe also for hard drives.
> I think Low Level Device Names need to be elaborated upon because,
> after reading, I still don't understand what they mean, do, or how
> they relate to the /dev/ files. If it cannot be elaborated upon
> without destroying the focus of the document, I'd best remove it
> altogether and throw it into a HOWTO about low-level hardware
> programming.
I would like to remove entirely this part, that is really difficult,
but some apps still use then, specially dealing with true SCSI (not
SATA nor IDE). This will probably have to be rewritten several times :-(
>
> Since 'Volume ID' is mentioned in the page, I think it needs to be
> defined. For someone who doesn't know that it's merely a useless
> label
it's not useless and is widely used now, but well defined in the fstab
man page. If I find when writing the rest of the doc that it's
necessary to define more, I will do, but this page is already very
long :-(
> sentences, though, are barely readable. However, I'll save picking
> that apart until you're happy with your drafts.
yes, there will certainly be many changes before the end, including
rewriting many sentences.
I even wonder if the end of this document shouldn't be moved to the
next one
thanks for your help, very appreciated
jdd
--
http://www.dodin.net
http://valerie.dodin.org
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t-eic8MSSfM
http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=1412160445
