From owner-freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Mon Jul 10 09:34:22 2017 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 CCA65DA2364 for ; Mon, 10 Jul 2017 09:34:22 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from matthew@FreeBSD.org) Received: from smtp.infracaninophile.co.uk (smtp.infracaninophile.co.uk [81.2.117.100]) (using TLSv1.2 with cipher ECDHE-RSA-AES256-GCM-SHA384 (256/256 bits)) (Client CN "smtp.infracaninophile.co.uk", Issuer "infracaninophile.co.uk" (not verified)) by mx1.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTPS id 5C0A882723 for ; Mon, 10 Jul 2017 09:34:21 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from matthew@FreeBSD.org) Received: from zero-gravitas.local (unknown [85.199.232.226]) (using TLSv1.2 with cipher ECDHE-RSA-AES128-GCM-SHA256 (128/128 bits)) (No client certificate requested) (Authenticated sender: m.seaman@infracaninophile.co.uk) by smtp.infracaninophile.co.uk (Postfix) with ESMTPSA id 704AECF93 for ; Mon, 10 Jul 2017 09:34:13 +0000 (UTC) Authentication-Results: smtp.infracaninophile.co.uk; dmarc=none header.from=FreeBSD.org Authentication-Results: smtp.infracaninophile.co.uk/704AECF93; dkim=none; dkim-atps=neutral Subject: Re: Unusual Question To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org References: <888578F8-AD68-4993-823C-152789F3C929@mail.sermon-archive.info> From: Matthew Seaman Message-ID: Date: Mon, 10 Jul 2017 10:34:11 +0100 User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh; Intel Mac OS X 10.12; rv:45.0) Gecko/20100101 Thunderbird/45.8.0 MIME-Version: 1.0 In-Reply-To: <888578F8-AD68-4993-823C-152789F3C929@mail.sermon-archive.info> Content-Type: multipart/signed; micalg=pgp-sha512; protocol="application/pgp-signature"; boundary="6GStM2knSQWOC9hhtWNWd1ai6DKwx0BmC" X-BeenThere: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.23 Precedence: list List-Id: User questions List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Mon, 10 Jul 2017 09:34:22 -0000 This is an OpenPGP/MIME signed message (RFC 4880 and 3156) --6GStM2knSQWOC9hhtWNWd1ai6DKwx0BmC Content-Type: multipart/mixed; boundary="QgWhl2lgkxwqaFR5CETtE4tgJa7pQrDXM"; protected-headers="v1" From: Matthew Seaman To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Message-ID: Subject: Re: Unusual Question References: <888578F8-AD68-4993-823C-152789F3C929@mail.sermon-archive.info> In-Reply-To: <888578F8-AD68-4993-823C-152789F3C929@mail.sermon-archive.info> --QgWhl2lgkxwqaFR5CETtE4tgJa7pQrDXM Content-Type: text/plain; charset=windows-1252 Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable On 2017/07/09 10:57, Doug Hardie wrote: > I have a FreeBSD 9.3 remote server that needs to be purged. I know > that rm -rf / will remove all the directory entries, but I need to > write over the drive. I thought that dd if=3D/dev/zero of=3D/dev/ada0 > might do the trick, but it gives an not permitted error. The whole > thing can crash and burn at the end. This is an unmanned site so > moving drives is not viable. I'd do this by usinf dd(1) but slightly more carefully. You need a small, temporary, bootable partition that contains dd(8). This could be either by booting from install media -- although as you say, the machine is in an unmanned location so that may not be feasible -- or you could possibly re-purpose an existing swap partition. You can then zero out each of the other partitions /dev/ada0p1 etc on your drive -- the idea being not to try and delete the OS you're running from, as that will likely crash in the middle and leave things half deleted. Cheers, Matthew --QgWhl2lgkxwqaFR5CETtE4tgJa7pQrDXM-- --6GStM2knSQWOC9hhtWNWd1ai6DKwx0BmC Content-Type: application/pgp-signature; name="signature.asc" Content-Description: OpenPGP digital signature Content-Disposition: attachment; filename="signature.asc" -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Comment: GPGTools - https://gpgtools.org iQJ8BAEBCgBmBQJZY0obXxSAAAAAAC4AKGlzc3Vlci1mcHJAbm90YXRpb25zLm9w ZW5wZ3AuZmlmdGhob3JzZW1hbi5uZXQxOUYxNTRFQ0JGMTEyRTUwNTQ0RTNGMzAw MDUxM0YxMEUwQTlFNEU3AAoJEABRPxDgqeTnZPsP/AupcfY3pL9IMgoHEeQyD9Q+ Xw2isg1KgKtMNLw1reNPKsSscXiMFT3qTwDs5qDHGbcQ7Yiq9yWw1WenIObLSJl3 38GXhQwKHHDC7+xBN/nwcfUzeZBPYEsGJjQRebe8H5a0NZGF+0N4FRLe1PpzYzrx nbm7a2tPZibKh7kBJLJMpYXhNLbu3DNnDbIcy5IZhi4TVYnW6sYoBNH/o719eDv1 d+w4bhxI3mJiQU1snH0/Y49Jubl45iN4A4vj7BgT7YEeFMgemPwY8d9j2P6WrMoy D8wQqzHYFizeIFZnti07ximanU/rKvc8zEJhPR6Hpp9aHQ0ELg1LunE/el/PePOp 9Ti5dHHe9GkvtARLoUhmTGi1PNk2IfXEwIl/55pTY3tY8acVGnKfBtwgqQucGqkD vUlkvAE+ynJg+Xd0l1575S6NOl1tXigRAzi5H55q89rhDuhJO69La8Z2d+h97Tqs D70ow1P1NCcIYwFq1d6dbbxcSNKV1zwh7OntsjMqw7FlowRYIv2a8mYmHNkBe9Xz JP3Vqbzwm+k7roOsTwq7hV82evcMV5XPk2/Z0pwZPuvqj4aHLwV1sFCGFkSce+YG vT96S8Aj/MRbxMjLJKEwNSf35Xthq7aEKbuQ9isvAVrfePC6yRRVRAW6CW5KAPJK 6S4i14dutO3jccWSYEU2 =5ts6 -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- --6GStM2knSQWOC9hhtWNWd1ai6DKwx0BmC--