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Date:      Thu, 23 Apr 2009 22:42:47 +0200
From:      cpghost <cpghost@cordula.ws>
To:        Michael David Crawford <mdc@prgmr.com>
Cc:        questions@freebsd.org
Subject:   Re: Modern FreeBSD Installer?
Message-ID:  <20090423204247.GA44182@phenom.cordula.ws>
In-Reply-To: <49F01DD6.6070406@prgmr.com>
References:  <714DFCFC-9547-497D-A2C7-0BA10B39B901@mac.com> <49EF82B2.2040807@gmail.com> <alpine.BSF.2.00.0904222316130.3543@wojtek.tensor.gdynia.pl> <49EF98C6.2060902@virtualhost.nl> <49EFA169.4050903@otenet.gr> <20090423084637.eb58cbe1.freebsd@edvax.de> <49F01208.2080705@otenet.gr> <20090423090727.c3460e7d.freebsd@edvax.de> <49F01C67.30205@otenet.gr> <49F01DD6.6070406@prgmr.com>

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On Thu, Apr 23, 2009 at 12:50:46AM -0700, Michael David Crawford wrote:
> The partitioner will allow you to create more partitions than the 
> FreeBSD partition table will allow.  Rather than giving it the name of a 
> special file in the /dev/directory, it will name it just "X".  You can 
> create as many partitions named "X" as you like.
> 
> Then the newfs will fail.
> 
> I experienced this the other day, and have been meaning to file a bug 
> report about it.

Yes, this is a long standing problem. On one or both of {Open,Net}BSD,
the number of possible partitions per slice is higher. I'd really wish
FreeBSD's bsdlabel(8) would allow for more partitions. The problem
here is not with sysinstall though. From bsdlabel(8):

     The partition table can have up to 8 entries.  It contains the following
     information:

     #       The partition identifier is a single letter in the range `a' to
             `h'.  By convention, partition `c' is reserved to describe the
             entire disk.

Take away 'b' for swap, and 'c' for the whole disk, you can only
use 6 partitions per slice (including the root partition) on the
bootable slice. That's clearly not enough, esp. on big disks, and
with complex setups. :-(

> Mike
> -- 
> Michael David Crawford
> mdc@prgmr.com

-cpghost.

-- 
Cordula's Web. http://www.cordula.ws/



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