From owner-freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Tue Sep 29 02:36:14 2015 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-questions@mailman.ysv.freebsd.org Received: from mx1.freebsd.org (mx1.freebsd.org [IPv6:2001:1900:2254:206a::19:1]) by mailman.ysv.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id D5469A068A1 for ; Tue, 29 Sep 2015 02:36:14 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from wblock@wonkity.com) Received: from wonkity.com (wonkity.com [67.158.26.137]) (using TLSv1.2 with cipher ECDHE-RSA-AES256-GCM-SHA384 (256/256 bits)) (Client CN "wonkity.com", Issuer "wonkity.com" (not verified)) by mx1.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTPS id 94629117C for ; Tue, 29 Sep 2015 02:36:14 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from wblock@wonkity.com) Received: from wonkity.com (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by wonkity.com (8.15.2/8.15.2) with ESMTPS id t8T2a9ql023034 (version=TLSv1.2 cipher=DHE-RSA-AES256-GCM-SHA384 bits=256 verify=NO); Mon, 28 Sep 2015 20:36:09 -0600 (MDT) (envelope-from wblock@wonkity.com) Received: from localhost (wblock@localhost) by wonkity.com (8.15.2/8.15.2/Submit) with ESMTP id t8T2a8Gu022991; Mon, 28 Sep 2015 20:36:08 -0600 (MDT) (envelope-from wblock@wonkity.com) Date: Mon, 28 Sep 2015 20:36:08 -0600 (MDT) From: Warren Block To: Polytropon cc: "William A. Mahaffey III" , FreeBSD Questions !!!! Subject: Re: dd question In-Reply-To: <20150928110851.593abd75.freebsd@edvax.de> Message-ID: References: <5606A4FF.4090105@hiwaay.net> <56073915.6030707@hiwaay.net> <20150927131036.c6b2d9ce.freebsd@edvax.de> <5607E84D.1050803@hiwaay.net> <20150927155354.7dab526a.freebsd@edvax.de> <5607F676.10307@hiwaay.net> <20150927160604.f1e1c21d.freebsd@edvax.de> <5607FA6E.5040600@hiwaay.net> <20150928110851.593abd75.freebsd@edvax.de> User-Agent: Alpine 2.20 (BSF 67 2015-01-07) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII; format=flowed X-Greylist: Sender IP whitelisted, not delayed by milter-greylist-4.4.3 (wonkity.com [127.0.0.1]); Mon, 28 Sep 2015 20:36:09 -0600 (MDT) X-BeenThere: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.20 Precedence: list List-Id: User questions List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Tue, 29 Sep 2015 02:36:14 -0000 On Mon, 28 Sep 2015, Polytropon wrote: > On Sun, 27 Sep 2015 19:00:47 -0600 (MDT), Warren Block wrote: >> On Sun, 27 Sep 2015, William A. Mahaffey III wrote: >> >>> If I use disklabel to add a 'd' slice, will that mess up what is already >>> there ? What is the syntax for that, I don't see it in the disklabel/bsdlabel >>> man page ? The man page for disklabel/bsdlabel shows a way to initialize a >>> whole disk using 'fdisk -BI ' & implies that this will create a 'da0s1' >>> slice in the process. However it will also wipe out what is already there. If >>> I do that, can I then copy the img-file contents in some way ? Thanks & TIA >>> :-) .... >> >> Please stop using fdisk and bsdlabel. gpart(8) does everything they do >> and is easier to use. > > But it works so nicely, especially for all the many > non-standard settings! :-) > > Sure, gpart (and in a related context, GPT) is the > way to go for 99% of use cases. Somehow I still like > the ability to ditch partitioning at all and just > newfs a device, or make a "one big bootable partition" > with two bsdlabel commands. This knowledge will soon > go down the drain, together with other "old craft" > of UNIX skills many decades old. :-) You can still put a filesystem on a raw device, and gpart will happily create bsdlabels. It is a general-purpose partitioning tool, and can write at least half a dozen partitioning schemes including bsdlabel and MBR. It uses the same type of commands regardless of the partitioning scheme. > As the installation image is best dealt with bsdlabel, > resizing 'c' and adding a 'd' partition should be possible, > with the commands run through a mdconfig'ured virtual > node connected to the image file. As I said, I haven't > tried this, but it's probably possible. In worst case, > it's a "try & fail" issue. :-) Try it with gpart. Consider it a test to see if gpart really is a replacement for bsdlabel.