From owner-freebsd-questions Thu Apr 11 18:54:22 1996 Return-Path: owner-questions Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.7.3/8.7.3) id SAA06913 for questions-outgoing; Thu, 11 Apr 1996 18:54:22 -0700 (PDT) Received: from riley-net170-164.uoregon.edu (riley-net170-164.uoregon.edu [128.223.170.164]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.7.3/8.7.3) with SMTP id SAA06905 for ; Thu, 11 Apr 1996 18:54:18 -0700 (PDT) Received: (from dwhite@localhost) by riley-net170-164.uoregon.edu (8.6.12/8.6.12) id TAA11094; Thu, 11 Apr 1996 19:37:31 -0700 Date: Thu, 11 Apr 1996 19:37:31 -0700 (PDT) From: Doug White Reply-To: dwhite@resnet.uoregon.edu To: "gary.corcoran" cc: questions@FreeBSD.org Subject: Re: Disk questions In-Reply-To: <9604102316.AA14420@stargazer> Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sender: owner-questions@FreeBSD.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk On Wed, 10 Apr 1996, gary.corcoran wrote: > I just added a second SCSI disk to my new FreeBSD setup to get some room to > grow beyond the basics. As I'm still a new user of FreeBSD, I have some > questions... > > 1. Is there any difference between what MS-DOS calls a 'partition' > and what FreeBSD calls a 'slice' ? They are one in the same (to keep from confusing with a BSD "partition", which is a, c, etc...) > 2. The man page isn't clear on this: are the 'offsets' in the disktab > describing the partitions relative to the _slice_ and NOT the start of the > entire disk? I _REALLY_ wish someone would write docs on how to add disks. It's stupid that there isn't any. PERFECT handbook item. ** HINT HINT HINT to you handbook writers ** To answer the question: I don't know. > 3. Does FreeBSD automagically find the FreeBSD partition (i.e. slice) based > on the entries in the MS-DOS partition table, thus enabling the FreeBSD > partitions to be described and accessed with only sizes and offsets relative > to the slice? For example, even though I have my FreeBSD partition/slice > as number 4, is it correct to simply access the FreeBSD filesystem on my > second disk as /dev/sd1a ? Yes. "Slice notation" as I call it is for clarity, and in some cases is required; otherwise it's a synonym and shouldn't make a difference, AFAIK. > 4. Under /dev, I noticed entries of the form sd?s[1-4]. Do these refer > to the various slices of sd0 and sd1 ? Yes. > 5. My primary swap is referenced as sd0s1b. How do I reference my swap > ('b' partition) on my second disk? I would guess that it might be > referenced as sd1s4b - but there is no such device in /dev. Can MAKEDEV > make this? If so, what option(s) should I give to MAKEDEV? ./MAKEDEV sd1 would be my guess. Again, either/or should work. Note that it may not necessarily be slice 4 on your second disk -- you would be better just calling it sd1b. > 6. Is sd1s4b the "proper" way to refer to my secondary swap partition, or > is sd1b okay/sufficient/the same ? I haven't tried to enable my secondary > swap yet - I don't want to accidently scribble on a wrong portion of my > disk! At least not until I learn how to make FreeBSD backups using my > new SCSI DAT drive which I also just installed... ;-} I would think sd1b would be more accurate. You don't know what slice FreeBSD is on the second disk -- it may be 1, 2, 3, or 4. You'd have to look with FDISK. Hope this helps. Doug White | University of Oregon Internet: dwhite@resnet.uoregon.edu | Residence Networking Assistant http://gladstone.uoregon.edu/~dwhite | Computer Science Major