From owner-freebsd-current@FreeBSD.ORG Mon Nov 1 19:47:35 2004 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 BF03A16A4CE for ; Mon, 1 Nov 2004 19:47:35 +0000 (GMT) Received: from odin.ac.hmc.edu (Odin.AC.HMC.Edu [134.173.32.75]) by mx1.FreeBSD.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 877F543D39 for ; Mon, 1 Nov 2004 19:47:35 +0000 (GMT) (envelope-from brdavis@odin.ac.hmc.edu) Received: from odin.ac.hmc.edu (localhost.localdomain [127.0.0.1]) by odin.ac.hmc.edu (8.13.0/8.13.0) with ESMTP id iA1JlXuv009895; Mon, 1 Nov 2004 11:47:33 -0800 Received: (from brdavis@localhost) by odin.ac.hmc.edu (8.13.0/8.13.0/Submit) id iA1JlX8b009894; Mon, 1 Nov 2004 11:47:33 -0800 Date: Mon, 1 Nov 2004 11:47:33 -0800 From: Brooks Davis To: David Gilbert Message-ID: <20041101194733.GB7517@odin.ac.hmc.edu> References: <41868F44.8070108@dclg.ca> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Disposition: inline In-Reply-To: <41868F44.8070108@dclg.ca> User-Agent: Mutt/1.4.1i X-Virus-Scanned: by amavisd-new X-Spam-Status: No, hits=0.0 required=8.0 tests=none autolearn=no version=2.63 X-Spam-Checker-Version: SpamAssassin 2.63 (2004-01-11) on odin.ac.hmc.edu cc: freebsd-current@freebsd.org Subject: Re: fsck --run-with-scissors 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, 01 Nov 2004 19:47:35 -0000 On Mon, Nov 01, 2004 at 02:32:20PM -0500, David Gilbert wrote: > You know... I've had a number of unrelated disk failures in the last 7 > days. In general, we have backups. Some of the failures are such that > I can still mount the fs readonly and avoid the dead area and get the > last iota of data off, but some are not. > > It would be really useful if fsck_ffs had a --run-with-scissors mode. > Meaning a mode of last resort that may or may not make the disk work and > may or may not totally screw with the disk. > > As an example, my laptop drive died. I don't really care about the data > on disk because it's backed up. However, it will be another day before > Dell shows up with a new drive... meaning that now I'm suffering in XP. > In many cases, if the block-in-question was written to (even though it > can't be read), it would be reallocated by the drive logic. Run with > scissors should write all zeros to a block it can't read. > > Are there any equivalents to --run-with-scissors? If you've got somewhere else you could put a copy of the disk, PHK committed a program called recoverdisk to current recently. It's in tools/tools/recoverdisk and you have to build it by hand, but it will copy a disk except for the bits that are too corrupt to read. -- Brooks