From owner-freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Sun Sep 27 15:40:23 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 88CF4A06063 for ; Sun, 27 Sep 2015 15:40:23 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from freebsd@edvax.de) Received: from mx01.qsc.de (mx01.qsc.de [213.148.129.14]) (using TLSv1 with cipher DHE-RSA-AES256-SHA (256/256 bits)) (Client did not present a certificate) by mx1.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTPS id 4A06EAA9 for ; Sun, 27 Sep 2015 15:40:22 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from freebsd@edvax.de) Received: from r56.edvax.de (port-92-195-125-111.dynamic.qsc.de [92.195.125.111]) (using TLSv1 with cipher DHE-RSA-AES256-SHA (256/256 bits)) (No client certificate requested) by mx01.qsc.de (Postfix) with ESMTPS id D54E23CC79; Sun, 27 Sep 2015 17:40:20 +0200 (CEST) Received: from r56.edvax.de (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by r56.edvax.de (8.14.5/8.14.5) with SMTP id t8RFeJvu002497; Sun, 27 Sep 2015 17:40:20 +0200 (CEST) (envelope-from freebsd@edvax.de) Date: Sun, 27 Sep 2015 17:40:19 +0200 From: Polytropon To: "William A. Mahaffey III" Cc: FreeBSD Questions !!!! Subject: Re: dd question Message-Id: <20150927174019.a4cfffcb.freebsd@edvax.de> In-Reply-To: <56080546.9030408@hiwaay.net> 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> <20150927164334.ccd67f04.freebsd@edvax.de> <56080546.9030408@hiwaay.net> Reply-To: Polytropon Organization: EDVAX X-Mailer: Sylpheed 3.1.1 (GTK+ 2.24.5; i386-portbld-freebsd8.2) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit 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: Sun, 27 Sep 2015 15:40:23 -0000 On Sun, 27 Sep 2015 10:09:04 -0453.75, William A. Mahaffey III wrote: > On 09/27/15 09:49, Polytropon wrote: > > Take the disklabel editor screen as an example. Make sure > > 'c' is as big as the whole device, then take the end of > > the last partition, 'a', as an offset, and add the desired > > size for 'd'. > > Hmmmm .... My 'c' slice is *not* the size of the whole drive: > > [root@kabini1, /etc, 9:54:38am] 596 % bsdlabel da0 > # /dev/da0: > 8 partitions: > # size offset fstype [fsize bsize bps/cpg] > a: 1401120 0 4.2BSD 0 0 0 > c: 1401120 0 unused 0 0 # "raw" part, > don't edit > [root@kabini1, /etc, 9:54:44am] 597 % Yes, and that's why you're seeing a partition occupied by data at 100%, but smaller than the USB drive itself. However, 'c' _can_ be the size of the media. It's not a problem when 'a' is the same size as 'c', which only means that the first partition is bootable and spans the whole available space. > 1401120 (sectors) * 512 (bytes/sector) = 7.173734e+08 Bytes or 717-ish > MB (700.56 MiB), which is what I'm seeing out of my mounted drive, not > the 4-ish GB (3.61-ish GiB) it should be .... Yes, that's the approx. 650...700 MB image which contains the partitioning information at the beginning. Keep in mind that this image, applied with dd, doesn't just contain data; it contains "meta-information" such as a boot sector and a partition table. This information is for the 700 MB amount the image requires, so the 4 GB media "looks smaller". > I'm guessing the drive > would boot & install OK, however it is convenient to be able to log the > proceedings in case of questions, that is what I am getting at .... That's a very useful feature - being able to mount an additional partition on the USB stick (no network required!) and use "script" or another program to store error logs or outputs (of "dmesg", "usbconfig" or other tools). Of course mounting the partition for access is a task up to the user, the installer will ignore it, but once it is there, it can be used, for example, if you want to copy some files before you start the installation, of have files ready you want to transfer after installation... -- Polytropon Magdeburg, Germany Happy FreeBSD user since 4.0 Andra moi ennepe, Mousa, ...