From owner-freebsd-stable Fri Dec 15 18:23: 1 2000 From owner-freebsd-stable@FreeBSD.ORG Fri Dec 15 18:22:58 2000 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-stable@freebsd.org Received: from mail.clones.com (unknown [216.70.178.182]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 8C25E37B400 for ; Fri, 15 Dec 2000 18:22:58 -0800 (PST) Received: from localhost (gross@localhost) by mail.clones.com (8.9.3/8.9.3) with ESMTP id SAA11748; Fri, 15 Dec 2000 18:18:21 -0800 Date: Fri, 15 Dec 2000 18:18:21 -0800 (PST) From: Glendon Gross To: Greg Lehey Cc: Mike Nowlin , Warner Losh , Sam Zamarripa , stable@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: Dedicated disks (was: Dangerously Dedicated) In-Reply-To: <20001215175842.B91832@wantadilla.lemis.com> Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sender: owner-freebsd-stable@FreeBSD.ORG Precedence: bulk X-Loop: FreeBSD.ORG Is there anyone interested in rewriting that "fake" partition table, or is that requirement satisfied by the non-dedicated format? I actually like sysinstall, now that I am used to it, but it would be aesthetically more pleasing to be able to use the dedicated format. I am curious if there could be some improvement to that "fake" partition table so it would boot from any BIOS, even if it means we have to write some "proprietary" signatures there. Is it possible to modify it so it will trick the BIOS's that are currently failing to boot? On Fri, 15 Dec 2000, Greg Lehey wrote: > On Friday, 15 December 2000 at 2:20:40 -0500, Mike Nowlin wrote: > > > >> Does that mean that such BIOS's are proprietary in the sense that they > >> don't recognize the dedicated format? > > > > There are times when the politically-correct of the world use the term > > "proprietary" when they actually mean "dumb" or "really badly > > designed". But yes, that's what it means... :) > > To be fair, the dedicated fake partition table format is a hack. It's > too difficult to figure out what the real geometry is, so it invents > one which should "do the job". Some BIOSes check the table and find > it wanting. It's a grey area. > > Greg > -- > Finger grog@lemis.com for PGP public key > See complete headers for address and phone numbers > > > To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org > with "unsubscribe freebsd-stable" in the body of the message > To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-stable" in the body of the message