Date: Mon, 22 May 2000 13:37:34 -0700 From: Kent Stewart <kstewart@3-cities.com> To: Mark Ovens <mark@ukug.uk.freebsd.org> Cc: leegold <leegold@erols.com>, FreeBSD-Questions@freebsd.org Subject: Re: ques: partition, slice, disk label, mounting point Message-ID: <39299A8E.5C91FA3@3-cities.com> References: <001601bfc3a1$f687a920$5edf7ad1@leegold1> <39298D57.955E8300@3-cities.com> <20000522204925.B2835@parish>
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Mark Ovens wrote: > > On Mon, May 22, 2000 at 12:41:11PM -0700, Kent Stewart wrote: > > > > > > leegold wrote: > > > > > > I've read tons of stuff on the web. still trying to understand the basics of > > > the FreeBSD installation. maybe if anyone could explain the following term, > > > concepts it would make a dent: > > > > > > disk labeling (vs. slices, partitions, mounting points ). > > > slices, (vs partitions, what's the difference). > > > mounting points. > > > how dirs (eg. \ ) are mounted to the partitions ( or is it slices ), why, > > > how, when? > > > > The \ concept has to go. It is now the way it was originally > > developed. Microsoft just didn't understand that the / key was easier > > to get to than the \ key was. > > > > Maybe Billy G is English? On a UK keyboard `\` is between `Z` and > Left-Shift and `/` is the same as a US keyboard (I think), next to > Right-Shift ;) Nah! He was born in the Seattle area. I'm not sure what keyboard they started out with on their early systems. The earliest systems they added their version of Basic to required serial terminals and they were probably using the equivalent of the VT100. There was a photograph of everyone that was located in Arizona. There wasn't a non-millionare in the bunch. Really geeky looking but with that much money no one cares :). This was just before all 7 or 8 of them moved back to Seattle (Redmond). I think all control characters should be reached with out having to use a special key (shift, alt, or control). On my XT keyboard, which is still in my basement, the \ is to the left of the left-shift key. The arrow on the shift key is almost worn off but the \ key almost looks un touched. The system only ran DOS. It was still a double reach with your left small finger. The / key was a much easier reach. I think they just didn't want to look like they were copying the terrible unix setup, which the whole tree concept was really based on. This is probably similar to talking about qwerty keyboards versus the more effective ones in terms of ease of use. Kent > > > It will be hard to talk to someone outside of the FreeBSD community > > about FreeBSD terminology. I have a great deal of trouble with the > > term slice. No matter what you do that conflicts with current > > terminology. It is the 100+K FreeBSD users against the 100+M users > > that don't understand. If you add a FreeBSD slice to an HD, your bios > > talks about it being a partition. I think we used a terminology that > > goes against the wind so to speak. > > > > When you think about the term slice, it also fits because you have > > really sliced the drive up and are creating a super extended > > partition. Since I am used to the FreeBSD usage, trying to install > > Linux on a system has been difficult. I need one system that will boot > > Linux and setting up one on my systems is really difficult. I don't > > have any problem adding FreeBSD and it is because of the slice > > concept. I added FreeBSD to an old system with NT 4 on it and both > > needed to be under 8GB to boot. The FreeBSD 4.0 slice located after > > the extended partition containing the NT boot worked just fine. It > > also made copying the existing disk structure from a 5GB to a 20GB a > > snap :). > > > > Some rules are: an HD can have 4 primary partitions on it. One of > > those partitions can be an extended partition. A slice is a primary > > partition and you can have more than 1. A slice can be larger than > > 8.4GB and your system will boot if and only if your / parition is > > separated from the other partitions. The / partition has to be totatly > > located in front of cylinder 1024, which is ~8.4GB using LBA. I go > > with a 100MB / partition and that has around 30% freespace. I separate > > out /var, /tmp, and /usr. I have a 500MB /var, a 1.5GB /tmp, and > > everything else is assigned to /usr. These sizes are extremely > > generous. When you have 12GB free, what is 500MB more or less :). Each > > FreeBSD partition is a mount point. Since they mount onto your / > > partition, they need unique names. The names for /, /var, /tmp, and > > /usr are not variables. They have to mount with those names precisely. > > Changing /usr to /kent would be like renaming your windows/system32 to > > /windows/lee and expecting windows to work. It won't. > > > > I add my users in /home which is linked to /usr/home. I can cd to > > ~seti and end up in /home/seti. The advantage in using the /home > > concept. > > > > There is a lot to learn. > - Kent Stewart Richland, WA mailto:kstewart@3-cities.com http://www.3-cities.com/~kstewart/index.html FreeBSD News http://daily.daemonnews.org/ SETI(Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence) @ HOME http://setiathome.ssl.berkeley.edu/ Hunting Archibald Stewart, b 1802 in Ballymena, Antrim Co., NIR http://www.3-cities.com/~kstewart/genealogy/archibald_stewart.html To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-questions" in the body of the message
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