Date: Fri, 20 Apr 2007 10:35:28 -0700 From: Marcel Moolenaar <xcllnt@mac.com> To: =?ISO-8859-1?Q?Dag-Erling_Sm=F8rgrav?= <des@des.no> Cc: freebsd-current@freebsd.org, Ivan Voras <ivoras@fer.hr>, freebsd-geom@freebsd.org Subject: Re: GPT as default? Message-ID: <619464E1-1CB4-4CFC-9ECF-7FC90DC24A20@mac.com> In-Reply-To: <86wt076k7u.fsf@dwp.des.no> References: <f0am4t$mmk$1@sea.gmane.org> <86wt076k7u.fsf@dwp.des.no>
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On Apr 20, 2007, at 10:15 AM, Dag-Erling Sm=F8rgrav wrote: > Ivan Voras <ivoras@fer.hr> writes: >> Many systems (including MacOS X and Solaris) are moving to GPT >> partitions (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GUID_Partition_Table), =20 >> mostly >> because they don't have the above limitations. My proposal is that we >> deprecate BSD labels and move to GPT in 7.0 (or more correctly, if =20= >> the >> stars were to be benevolent on us, on the new systems that are >> installed by the new GPT-aware installer :) ). > > Not unless geom_gpt receives considerable attention. It receives attention. > Currently, it is not even possible to list the GPT, let alone create > new partitions, if one of the partitions is open. GPT can not be the > default partitioning scheme until this is addressed. You can list with the -r option. You cannot create unless you allow foot-shooting in GEOM (i.e. set kern.geom.debugflags=3D16). The latter a known side-effect of GEOM and has nothing to do with GPT itself. Anyway: The new G_PART class is there to fix it... >> The second is more serious: FreeBSD boot code cannot boot from a GPT >> partition. >> >> Part of the problem is that GPT uses GUIDs for distinguishing >> partition types, so the current code that recognizes various =20 >> partition >> types (Linux, FreeBSD, NTFS - the famous "F1" prompt) may need to be >> thrown out since each GUID is 16 bytes long and AFAIK there's only >> about 300 bytes in the MBR for the boot code. > > DOS partitions normally start on a cylinder boundary, even though > cylinders no longer mean anything. This means there is plenty of > space for code and data between the MBR and the first partition. > > I don't know if this is also the case with GPT. It isn't. If disk space is needed, one can always create a partition for it. There's no need to stuff things in anonymous sectors. --=20 Marcel Moolenaar xcllnt@mac.com
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