[LMB] AKICOTL: Technical question OT:

[Mark Allums]

James wrote:
> On Jan 23, 2008 8:23 PM, Mark Allums <mark at allums.com> wrote:
>> It seems that XP doesn't allow drives classed as removable to be
>> formatted with NTFS.  NTFS "volumes" are mounted with write caching
>> enabled.  It is possible to turn off write caching for a drive, but
>> Windows regards it as anathema, and it has a tendency not to "stick".
>> Trying to turn off write caching for NTFS is futile--it will not stay
>> off permanently.
> 
> Ah. I rarely format disks externally with NTFS, so I didn't know that.
> Though, there are tricks to get NTFS where Windows doesn't want it
> (e.g., on a floppy disk).

Yes.  And perhaps there are ways to use NTFS rationally (with registry 
hacks, or something), but I am ignorant of the methods.  I distrust a 
lot of info I find on the subject with Google.  I would like to know how 
to format a floppy in NTFS, just for curiousity's sake.

Actually, one *can* format a removable drive with NTFS, by changing the 
property of the drive from <optimize for safety> to <optimize for 
performance>, but one then has to be very careful to unmount the drive 
properly *every time*.  And Windows can be stubborn about letting that 
drive go.  More often than not, I get the "device cannot be stopped" 
message.  Very frustrating.

>> I would have preferred for Microsoft to have used better judgment in
>> making these rules, but we are stuck with their decisions.  A modern
>> file system without archaic limits, but user-friendly, appears to be too
>> much to ask for.  UNIX/Linux/etc. is not much better.  It is exceedingly
>> difficult to format a USB flash drive in Linux.  For me, at least.  In
>> Debian.  And one wouldn't want to use a modern file system with it,
>> anyway.  Un*x is even more anal about write caching than Windows.  Sigh.
> 
> True, but I'm often tasked with fixing corrupted flash disks, memory
> cards, etc using Linux. The partition table on those things usually
> gets corrupted trivially easily, requiring a dd to zero the first few
> sectors, fdisk to partition, then mkdosfs/mke2fs (or mkfs.ext2/3,
> mkfs.vfat), and it's good as new. I find Windows' inability to fix a
> corrupted partition table on a removable disk one of its biggest
> downfalls. Which is why I end up having to fix it for a number of
> people, because I have a Linux box at my desk.

Ah.  I am still learning the ways of Linux.  I do know of dd, fdisk, and 
mkfs, but it never occurs to me to use dd.  dd is so *raw*.  I never 
could get fdisk to partition a flash drive, but perhaps I missed 
something.  Anyway, my primary goal for that drive is to use it under 
XP, so ext2/3 is out.  Especially ext3.  MINIXfs might be almost 
practical, but teaching it to Windows would not be worth the effort, I 
think.

(Speaking of Reiserfs, do you have any wisdom on it?  (Other than don't 
forget to compile support for it into your custom kernel after 
formatting the root and boot partitions in it, as I did once.)


>> (Splitting files is undesirable.  The whole purchase of a large and
>> expensive 8G flash drive was in order to avoid this.)
> 
> Of course, what files are so big? Most of the time I tend to avoid big
> files just to avoid issues with programs who may be programmed with
> 32-bit offsets.

Oh, no smuggling of proprietary databases or pirating of DVDs, just 
transporting the odd (rather large) .ISO* or two from a place of high 
speed internet access to home base (low speed internet access).  Please 
don't ask me to actually burn the DVD at the high-speed place.  Please?

--Mark Allums

* .ISOs of the latest update of some Linux distribution, perhaps Knoppix 
(highly useful) or this week's Debian "Lenny", for example.