From owner-freebsd-current@FreeBSD.ORG Mon Apr 4 16:38:45 2005 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-current@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.FreeBSD.org (mx1.freebsd.org [216.136.204.125]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 9C79016A4CE for ; Mon, 4 Apr 2005 16:38:45 +0000 (GMT) Received: from mail-gw1.york.ac.uk (mail-gw1.york.ac.uk [144.32.128.246]) by mx1.FreeBSD.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id F02F043D58 for ; Mon, 4 Apr 2005 16:38:44 +0000 (GMT) (envelope-from gavin.atkinson@ury.york.ac.uk) Received: from buffy.york.ac.uk (buffy-128.york.ac.uk [144.32.128.165]) by mail-gw1.york.ac.uk (8.12.10/8.12.10) with ESMTP id j34Gcde2012382; Mon, 4 Apr 2005 17:38:39 +0100 (BST) Received: from buffy.york.ac.uk (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by buffy.york.ac.uk (8.13.3/8.13.1) with ESMTP id j34Gcawt072266; Mon, 4 Apr 2005 17:38:37 +0100 (BST) (envelope-from gavin.atkinson@ury.york.ac.uk) Received: (from ga9@localhost) by buffy.york.ac.uk (8.13.3/8.13.1/Submit) id j34GcXjS072265; Mon, 4 Apr 2005 17:38:33 +0100 (BST) (envelope-from gavin.atkinson@ury.york.ac.uk) X-Authentication-Warning: buffy.york.ac.uk: ga9 set sender to gavin.atkinson@ury.york.ac.uk using -f From: Gavin Atkinson To: Poul-Henning Kamp In-Reply-To: <1729.1112622423@critter.freebsd.dk> References: <1729.1112622423@critter.freebsd.dk> Content-Type: text/plain Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Date: Mon, 04 Apr 2005 17:38:33 +0100 Message-Id: <1112632713.71324.52.camel@buffy.york.ac.uk> Mime-Version: 1.0 X-Mailer: Evolution 2.2.1.1 FreeBSD GNOME Team Port X-York-MailScanner: Found to be clean X-York-MailScanner-From: gavin.atkinson@ury.york.ac.uk cc: current@freebsd.org cc: Andrey Chernov Subject: Re: Can't change partition table anymore X-BeenThere: freebsd-current@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.1 Precedence: list List-Id: Discussions about the use of FreeBSD-current List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Mon, 04 Apr 2005 16:38:45 -0000 On Mon, 2005-04-04 at 15:47 +0200, Poul-Henning Kamp wrote: > In message <1112618841.71324.23.camel@buffy.york.ac.uk>, Gavin Atkinson writes: > >On Mon, 2005-04-04 at 07:28 +0400, Andrey Chernov wrote: > >> BTW, the trick with kern.geom.debugflags=16 works and I put it permanently > >> in my sysctl.conf. Could you please make it ON by default or make a > >> warning at least? > > > >I actually agree with this. It's so frustrating to not be able to do > >what you want to do as root. > > I tend to belive in sensible safety features. Forcing people who > do potentially dangerous acts to release the safety-catch mechanism > first doesn't strike me as a bad idea. > > Only the most orthodox darwinists argue that guns should be sold > armed and loaded from curb-side, child-height baskets. Only the most anti-gun people would say that the safety catch should consist of a codeword only known by the guy who designed the gun and four or five other people who work at the factory. We're not talking about curb-side child-height baskets. We're talking about people who should know what they are doing (they have root, after all), entering commands which they expect to work... gmirror label -v -b round-robin data da0 bsdlabel -e da0s1 There are plenty of other ways to trash a system accidentally without raw access to the disk, and there are plenty of reasons to want to manipulate the raw disk which won't trash the system. Do you honestly believe the best way to do this is to boot off a fixit CD or to toggle a random bit? This is something I strongly believe in. If someone who understands the geom design were to suggest how best to overcome the problem, then I'd be willing to put some time into finding a solution. I don't believe what we have now is the best solution. Gavin