RE: [expert] Use of Windows may be hazardous to your Linux

[Klar Brian D Contr MSG/SWS]

Here at the Air Force Base, our systems are so locked down that we cant even set the 
clock on the PC. Therefore, sorry if my mails don't come through eye appealing.

Brian D. Klar - CVE
OTS
WPAFB
(937)257-5773
937-973-3125 (Pager)


-Original Message-
From: Hans Schneidhofer [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]
Sent: Friday, April 21, 2000 5:26 AM
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: RE: [expert] Use of Windows may be hazardous to your Linux


Am Don, 20 Apr 2000 schrieben Sie:
> I have had problems with Win defrag on my dual boot system. 98 does something to my 
>secondary drive. That drive is partitioned 2Gig for Win and 4Gig for linux. This 
>drive was partitioned with linux fdisk. I had to turn off defragging my second drive 
>altogether. I use loadlin and since have had no probs with defragging since this is 
>not my boot drive for win.
> 
> Brian D. Klar - CVE
> OTS
> WPAFB
> (937)257-5773
> 937-973-3125 (Pager)

Hi Brian,

please let your maileditor know, that you would format your mails with about 70
or 80 characters per line. It isn't very understandable at a glance to read
mails with 363 charcters per line. You can believe me. Really.

bye 
Hans Schneidhofer

Re: [expert] Use of Windows may be hazardous to your Linux

[John Aldrich]

On Fri, 21 Apr 2000, you wrote:
[CHOMP]
> 
>   I mean that when using defrag, the program continued
> defragmenting the next partition without  realize that. That's why he
> recommended me that the first partition after a win partition should be
> the swap one, that doesn't matter if it is destroyed.
>
Logical precaution. I agree with the sentiments. :-)
John

Re: [expert] Use of Windows may be hazardous to your Linux

[tessonec]

Hi
  Well, when i first installed Linux (during '98) the guy who
bring me the debian CDs that i used to set up my box told me that i
shouldn't put the root directory (i mean "/") after a vfat partition
because he experienced the problem that when he was running win-defrag,
such program sometimes continued defragmentating cylinders contiguous (BUT
NOT BELONGING) to the partition thet he was trying to defragment. Does
someone understand this sentence 

  I mean that when using defrag, the program continued
defragmenting the next partition without  realize that. That's why he
recommended me that the first partition after a win partition should be
the swap one, that doesn't matter if it is destroyed.

Then i adopted :

!/
!---
!win
!---
!swap
!---
!/usr
!---
!/home
!---

Is it nosense??? i hope not

-
Claudio J. Tessone
E-Mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Departamento de Fisica- Fac. de Cs. Exactas
Calle 47 y 115.
1900- La Plata. Bs. As.
Argentina
-

RE: [expert] Use of Windows may be hazardous to your Linux

[Hans Schneidhofer]

Am Don, 20 Apr 2000 schrieben Sie:
> I have had problems with Win defrag on my dual boot system. 98 does something to my 
>secondary drive. That drive is partitioned 2Gig for Win and 4Gig for linux. This 
>drive was partitioned with linux fdisk. I had to turn off defragging my second drive 
>altogether. I use loadlin and since have had no probs with defragging since this is 
>not my boot drive for win.
> 
> Brian D. Klar - CVE
> OTS
> WPAFB
> (937)257-5773
> 937-973-3125 (Pager)

Hi Brian,

please let your maileditor know, that you would format your mails with about 70
or 80 characters per line. It isn't very understandable at a glance to read
mails with 363 charcters per line. You can believe me. Really.

bye 
Hans Schneidhofer

Re: [expert] Use of Windows may be hazardous to your Linux

[Wolfgang Bornath]

On Thu, Apr 20, 2000 at 13:41 -0400, John Aldrich wrote:
 
> Doc (et al):
> As long as you don't make Windows aware of the Linux
> partition, (by using M$ Fdisk to create the "extended"
> partition that Linux lives in) you shouldn't have a
> problem. However, if you DID use Windows FDISK, I would be
> EXTREMELY careful about using Defrag!
>   John

To make it clear once more:

I *did not* use M$ Fdisk to create the partition which got
damaged.
M$ is not able to create more than one primary partition on one
harddisk. The damaged partition (/dev/hda2) was a *primary*
partition.
So Windows could *not* know about the second primary partition
with Linux on it. And BTW, I always had the root partition of
Linux on a primary partition, so that I never run the risk of
getting my Linux damaged by Windows. Or so I thought

So the proposed cause could not be in effect here.

wobo
-- 
GPG-Fingerprint: FE5A 0891 7027 8D1B 4E3F  73C1 AD9B D732 A698 82EE
For Public Key mailto [EMAIL PROTECTED] with Subject: GPG-Request
---
ISDN4LINUX-FAQ -- Deutsch: http://www.wolf-b.de/i4l/i4lfaq-de.html

Re: [expert] Use of Windows may be hazardous to your Linux

[Wolfgang Bornath]

On Thu, Apr 20, 2000 at 14:53 -0400, Brian T. Schellenberger wrote:
> 
> It's also possible that the partitions overlap.
> 
> Mandrake 7.0 will make such things.  Run fdisk and see if that might
> happen. You wouldn't notice a problem until Windows tried to write to
> the end of the partition, such as when you ran a defrag program.
> 
> If this is it, you'll have to blame Mandrake rather than Microsoft, I'm
> afraid.

I heard about that one. So I checked the start/end numbers of
the partitions (using Linux fdisk). No overlapping. And BTW, it
was only a certain version of DiskDrake doing that. If you use
fdisk during installation you avoid that risk. 

wobo
-- 
GPG-Fingerprint: FE5A 0891 7027 8D1B 4E3F  73C1 AD9B D732 A698 82EE
For Public Key mailto [EMAIL PROTECTED] with Subject: GPG-Request
---
ISDN4LINUX-FAQ -- Deutsch: http://www.wolf-b.de/i4l/i4lfaq-de.html

Re: [expert] Use of Windows may be hazardous to your Linux

[Wolfgang Bornath]

On Fri, Apr 21, 2000 at 11:41 -0500, Lyndon Lininger Sr. wrote:
> I've never had a problem on a dual boot system with defraging the windows
> partitions. You must have been very unlucky or your hard drive got flaky.

I also thought about the disk moving out to retirement. Ran some
extensive tests last night. Disk is ok.

I never experienced this before with Win3.1 or Win95. Just now
with Win98. Now Win and Linux are on separate harddisks.

wobo
-- 
GPG-Fingerprint: FE5A 0891 7027 8D1B 4E3F  73C1 AD9B D732 A698 82EE
For Public Key mailto [EMAIL PROTECTED] with Subject: GPG-Request
---
ISDN4LINUX-FAQ -- Deutsch: http://www.wolf-b.de/i4l/i4lfaq-de.html

Re: [expert] Use of Windows may be hazardous to your Linux

[Wolfgang Bornath]

On Thu, Apr 20, 2000 at 15:20 -0400, John Aldrich wrote:
> On Thu, 20 Apr 2000, you wrote:
> > 
> > Good advice, John, but I knew that one before. I always do only
> > the "C:" partition with M$-fdisk. Every other partition is
> > created by Linux.
> > Next point: As you may see it was not the extended partition
> > which got "mugged", it was the second primary partition. That is
> > a sure sign that I did not set it up with M$-fdisk!
> > 
> Actually, IIRC, you *can* use DOS FDISK, but it won't LIKE
> doing it. :-)

I*I*RC, if you order DOS FDISK to create a primary partition and
there is already one on the disk it just sits there and says:
"Can't you see that there is already one primary partition? I
won't do that!"

Just tried it out last night on a Win-only machine with one
primary partition of 1.0G and 3G left unpartitioned. DOS/WIN98
FDISK didn't do it. I booted a miniLinux and used Linux fdisk.

wobo
--  
GPG-Fingerprint: FE5A 0891 7027 8D1B 4E3F  73C1 AD9B D732 A698 82EE
For Public Key mailto [EMAIL PROTECTED] with Subject: GPG-Request
---
ISDN4LINUX-FAQ -- Deutsch: http://www.wolf-b.de/i4l/i4lfaq-de.html

Re: [expert] Use of Windows may be hazardous to your Linux

[Rial Juan]

Sorry, John, but that makes absolutely no sense. DOS Fdisk is an MS-Dos
program. It's only purpose is: to set up partitions, or in more detail: to set
pointers to begin and end cylinders on the drive, and map partitions to it in
the 'TOC' of your harddrive, together with the partition type.

After doing this, it reboots the machine (or at least: YOU should reboot the
machine), since the new partitions aren't usable right yet; the 'TOC' must be
re-read by the BIOS or the bootloader or something I suppose. During this
reboot, DOS Fdisk gets thrown out of system memory.

After the reboot, you should format any DOS-drives, and then you can install
windows.

Now, since Fdisk is NOT running anymore when you install windows, how can it
tell windows where your partitions are? Well, it could leave a 'note' for
windows somewhere in the 'TOC', but that would mean that this write function
should be written into Fdisk, and a read function into Windows, and in such a
way that it doesn't screw up the partition table in any way. For what purpose
would anyone, even at Microsoft, do something silly like that when it's
perfectly possible for any program to just read out the 'TOC' of the harddrive,
and thereby figuring out the locations of any partitions?

I don't know where the partitions get read at boot time, but it happens long
before Windows boots, probably even before DOS boots. I guess the bootloader on
the MBR takes care of this.

Anyway, point being: Windows can read the partition table at any time, so it
really doesn't need the drive formatted with Fdisk for DOS to know where your
linux partitions are.

What did went wrong here then? My guess is hda1 and hda2 are overlapping, as
suggested by somebody else on this list. That's the first thing to come to mind,
although it might be 'coz of some other reason too, who knows?


On Apr 20 [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:

> I'm guessing you used DOS Fdisk to create the extended
> partition for your Linux. This is a "bad idea" (tm).  This
> makes Windows aware of that partition. Next time, just
> leave empty space at the end of your Windows drive and let
> Linux do the partitioning.
>   John


-- 

Rial Juan
e-mail:  [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Belgiumtel:(++32) 89/856533
ulyssis system admininstrator   

The little critters in nature; they don't know they're ugly.
That's very funny... A fly marying a bumble-bee...



Sign the petition at http://www.libranet.com/petition.html
Help bring us more Linux Drivers

Re: [expert] Use of Windows may be hazardous to your Linux

[Ron Stodden]

Daniel Woods wrote:

> Is is ok if you let Partition Magic 4/5 do it ?

Not only is it OK, but it is the ONLY way to manage disk partitioning
if you don't want serious problems.  PM also includes an excellent
DOS program PARTINFO which will tell you everything that is wrong
with your partitioning (usually plenty).   

Quite simply, you do not have a reliable system until PARTINFO gives
you a clean report without even any warnings.

-- 

Regards,

Ron. [AU] - sent by Linux.

Re: [expert] Use of Windows may be hazardous to your Linux

[John Aldrich]

On Thu, 20 Apr 2000, you wrote:
> I have linux installed on the primary partition of my HD, with windows
> installed on the second.  The disk was originally split using dos fdisk, though
> the first partition was formatted using diskdrake.  I want to run a Nortons
> utils speed disk on my C drive, but now I am not so sure!!!  Will nortons
> effect it or is it only wind'ohs defrag that will f&*k it up?
> 
It *may* mess it up. I would think twice about running it.
John

Re: [expert] Use of Windows may be hazardous to your Linux

[Linda Walsh]

John Aldrich wrote:
> 
> On Thu, 20 Apr 2000, you wrote:
> > > I'm guessing you used DOS Fdisk to create the extended
> > > partition for your Linux. This is a "bad idea" (tm).  This
> > > makes Windows aware of that partition. Next time, just
> > > leave empty space at the end of your Windows drive and let
> > > Linux do the partitioning.
> > > John
> >
> > Is is ok if you let Partition Magic 4/5 do it ?
> >
---
I started with a windows machine (22.5G laptop) from Dell (before they
offered their stripped down linux versions).  I used partition magic to shrink
the dos size down to about 45% and used it to create:
Primary 2 - 256Mb /boot
Primary 3 - 256Mb swap
Primary 4 - extended
ext 1 - 512M /tmp
ext 2 - 1024M /var
ext 3 - 4.7G /
ext 4 - the rest - /home
---
I've never had a problem with defrag'ing (W98R2) walking out of primary 1.
I just recently used PM5 to further shrink down the windows to about 5.6G
since I got VMware I can use disk space in the linux partitions for DOS if needed.
/home is about 10G now.  PM5 resized Dos down, moved all the partitions down and
then expanded home -- no problem.

I also recently got Norton Util's 2000 and it's disk defragmenter causes
no problems either.

So now my *usual* setup is Windows in a VMware box (either suspended or just
closed) set for 128M for Windows (Internal to Windows it has its own 256M swap) and
Linux up full time.  Have a few hiccups now and then, but nothing serious.  I have
my windows partition setup to boot into VMWare or on the real hardware (in case
I want something like DVD play or I'm dealing with some VMWare incompatibility).
I just have to reload the diaplay driver each time in windows -- got that down to
an art though (for some reason hardware profiles does do it's job for the display
driver -- munges my icons each time, since going to either first time boots
to 640x480 (down from normal 1280x1024).  However, usually, I just use VMware --
occasionally I have my screen split -- windows on one side, Linux on the other to
copy /paste some text or do a linux task in the middle of a windows task -- but 
often the VMware box is minimized -- then I just CTR-ALT-F8 to flip to Windows,
or CTL-ALT-F7 for Linux.  I store most of my files on the Linux part now -- I
just export my home as a Samba share and Windows treats it like a fairly fast
network drive.  I run my Windows disk partitioning in background while I work
in my Linux part -- that way I don't have to worry about the defrag restarting all
the time due to disk writes -- since from the Windows machine perspective, nobody
is accessing 'its' disk. 

It's all tres sweet.  Also, as added protection, VMware can be configured to
prohibit access to any other partitions to the guest-OS.  I find that read access
of the header partition (0) is needed by Norton for it to do it's checks.  But
it doesn't try to do any writes.

Fairly happy camper.  ...

-linda

-- 
Linda A Walsh| Trust Technology, Core Linux, SGI
[EMAIL PROTECTED]  | Voice: (650) 933-5338

Re: [expert] Use of Windows may be hazardous to your Linux

[Wayne Petherick]

I have linux installed on the primary partition of my HD, with windows
installed on the second.  The disk was originally split using dos fdisk, though
the first partition was formatted using diskdrake.  I want to run a Nortons
utils speed disk on my C drive, but now I am not so sure!!!  Will nortons
effect it or is it only wind'ohs defrag that will f&*k it up?

Wayne

Re: [expert] Use of Windows may be hazardous to your Linux

[D. R. Evans]

-BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-

On 20 Apr 00, at 13:50, John Aldrich wrote:

>
> > Is is ok if you let Partition Magic 4/5 do it ?
> > 
> MAYBE. I'd still suggest using Linux to partition it,

I used PM 5.0, and I'm not going to risk defragging. Theoretically, it 
_should_ be OK, but PM was running under Windows (of course) and I don't 
trust Gates' wonderfully invasive system enough to be certain that it 
doesn't think, at least at some low level, that it still owns the whole 
drive.

  Doc


-BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-
Version: PGP 6.0.2 -- QDPGP 2.60 
Comment: Key obtainable from servers: ID 0x6184B81D

iQCVAwUBOP9n6f2CFbFhhLgdAQGOigP/Uvf3mH4X7Y/h02O03gUbBtYkhhrKoxaC
+qZDihybT25mRaCIA6KgrY9ECJrWdzkBrZIcSAmrQxy415K/RaT7RGfdzsTrEq13
FjRGDQn5tlG5fBWLc54zrAefUy6D0O5fTbumzAkcKck9zy/DPPFD8k93eGHwbgHE
PAb/eZX4TOs=
=qzgk
-END PGP SIGNATURE-

--
D.R. Evans N7DR / G4AMJ  [EMAIL PROTECTED]

"Palindor Chronicles" information and extracts:
   http://www.sff.net/people/N7DR/drevans.htp
--

Re: [expert] Use of Windows may be hazardous to your Linux

[Pj]

I've had some minor problems running defrag on three drives, before
Linux. Two drives were W98 and one W95. When I selected defrag "all
drives", I noticed a lot of thrashing on the W95 drive. From that point
on I selected each drive to defrag individually, and eliminated that
problem. I added Linux at the bottom of the drive outside of the 1024
range. As it wasn't recognized, Window didn't try to defrag it. I've
probably been blessed with newbie dumb luck. 

Pj

Re: [expert] Use of Windows may be hazardous to your Linux

[John Aldrich]

On Thu, 20 Apr 2000, you wrote:
> 
> Good advice, John, but I knew that one before. I always do only
> the "C:" partition with M$-fdisk. Every other partition is
> created by Linux.
> Next point: As you may see it was not the extended partition
> which got "mugged", it was the second primary partition. That is
> a sure sign that I did not set it up with M$-fdisk!
> 
Actually, IIRC, you *can* use DOS FDISK, but it won't LIKE
doing it. :-)
John

Re: [expert] Use of Windows may be hazardous to your Linux

[Pj]

Luckily, this has not been my experience. I partitioned Win and Linux
using Partition Magic 5.0. LILO is not in my MBR; Winblows does not know
Linux exists; defrag works correctly; and Win files are on my KDE
desktop. 

Pj

Lyndon Lininger Sr. wrote:
> 
> I've never had a problem on a dual boot system with defraging the windows
> partitions. You must have been very unlucky or your hard drive got flaky.
> 
> Lyndon Lininger Sr.
> 
> - Original Message -
> From: "D. R. Evans" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> Sent: Thursday, April 20, 2000 10:54 AM
> Subject: Re: [expert] Use of Windows may be hazardous to your Linux
> 
> > -BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-
> >
> > On 20 Apr 00, at 14:33, Wolfgang Bornath wrote:
> >
> >
> > > What happened? Windows defrag destroyed the superblock of
> > > primary partition /dev/hda2 although it was told to just defrag
> > > "C:"! The other partitions where untouched and without errors.
> > >
> >
> > Wow! I really appreciate this posting.
> >
> > Normally I defrag my Windows junk every couple of months. Having just put
> > Linux on my brand new Win98 box, I hadn't given a moment's thought to
> > changing this practice, and fully expected to do a defrag sometime in the
> > next month or so. Now I won't!
> >
> > This seems so fundamental that I'm surprised I haven't seen words to this
> > effect somewhere else. Or maybe you were just very, very (un)lucky.
> >
> >   Doc Evans
> >
> >
> > -BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-
> > Version: PGP 6.0.2 -- QDPGP 2.60
> > Comment: Key obtainable from servers: ID 0x6184B81D
> >
> > iQCVAwUBOP8oG/2CFbFhhLgdAQGRvgQAi/cC4jODxHgmHn7CbveGMxyfabsZqvOt
> > EWKPEaSY3/NEzY+pXRG0xc30zglkBKEltSZfpKFZMl/vuAr0J21ZxuXqxUi1BjhO
> > q5NTAhtwtOBy2eZPT4dStn6sKRFeGbFg3TOmZed05DK7FXwRndZyKqq4SYDNMs8V
> > zzj88aHSsdA=
> > =D0y9
> > -END PGP SIGNATURE-
> >
> > --
> > D.R. Evans N7DR / G4AMJ  [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> >
> > "Palindor Chronicles" information and extracts:
> >http://www.sff.net/people/N7DR/drevans.htp
> > --

Re: [expert] Use of Windows may be hazardous to your Linux

[Brian T. Schellenberger]

It's also possible that the partitions overlap.

Mandrake 7.0 will make such things.  Run fdisk and see if that might
happen. You wouldn't notice a problem until Windows tried to write to
the end of the partition, such as when you ran a defrag program.

If this is it, you'll have to blame Mandrake rather than Microsoft, I'm
afraid.

John Aldrich wrote:
> 
> On Thu, 20 Apr 2000, you wrote:
> > Hi,
> >
> > My WIndows98 has done it again!
> >
> >
> > Yesterday I booted into Windows to look at my bankaccount. Being
> > there I thought it a good idea to defrag "C:" (/dev/hda1) as I
> > was told to do so every now and then.
> > Checked the options of defrag, told the program to work on "C:"
> > and nowhere else, started the app and went to bed.
> > This morning the screen told me that defrag had done its task
> > without errors. I closed Windows and booted into Linux -- I
> > tried to boot into Linux!
> > The boot process (via LILO) started normal but somewhere before
> > entering interactive mode it hanged. The first time I had to hit
> > the reset button since I use Linux!
> > Booting with a floppy revealed that there was no /boot on
> > /dev/hda2.
> [snip]
> > What happened? Windows defrag destroyed the superblock of
> > primary partition /dev/hda2 although it was told to just defrag
> > "C:"! The other partitions where untouched and without errors.
> >
> I'm guessing you used DOS Fdisk to create the extended
> partition for your Linux. This is a "bad idea" (tm).  This
> makes Windows aware of that partition. Next time, just
> leave empty space at the end of your Windows drive and let
> Linux do the partitioning.
> John

-- 
"Brian, the man from babble-on" [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Brian T. Schellenberger http://www.babbleon.org
Support http://www.eff.org. Support decss
defendents.
Support http://www.programming-freedom.org. Boycott amazon.com.

RE: [expert] Use of Windows may be hazardous to your Linux

[Klar Brian D Contr MSG/SWS]

I have had problems with Win defrag on my dual boot system. 98 does something to my 
secondary drive. That drive is partitioned 2Gig for Win and 4Gig for linux. This drive 
was partitioned with linux fdisk. I had to turn off defragging my second drive 
altogether. I use loadlin and since have had no probs with defragging since this is 
not my boot drive for win.

Brian D. Klar - CVE
OTS
WPAFB
(937)257-5773
937-973-3125 (Pager)


-Original Message-
From: Lyndon Lininger Sr. [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]
Sent: Friday, April 21, 2000 12:42 PM
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: Re: [expert] Use of Windows may be hazardous to your Linux


I've never had a problem on a dual boot system with defraging the windows
partitions. You must have been very unlucky or your hard drive got flaky.

Lyndon Lininger Sr.

- Original Message -
From: "D. R. Evans" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Sent: Thursday, April 20, 2000 10:54 AM
Subject: Re: [expert] Use of Windows may be hazardous to your Linux


> -BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-
>
> On 20 Apr 00, at 14:33, Wolfgang Bornath wrote:
>
>
> > What happened? Windows defrag destroyed the superblock of
> > primary partition /dev/hda2 although it was told to just defrag
> > "C:"! The other partitions where untouched and without errors.
> >
>
> Wow! I really appreciate this posting.
>
> Normally I defrag my Windows junk every couple of months. Having just put
> Linux on my brand new Win98 box, I hadn't given a moment's thought to
> changing this practice, and fully expected to do a defrag sometime in the
> next month or so. Now I won't!
>
> This seems so fundamental that I'm surprised I haven't seen words to this
> effect somewhere else. Or maybe you were just very, very (un)lucky.
>
>   Doc Evans
>
>
> -BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-
> Version: PGP 6.0.2 -- QDPGP 2.60
> Comment: Key obtainable from servers: ID 0x6184B81D
>
> iQCVAwUBOP8oG/2CFbFhhLgdAQGRvgQAi/cC4jODxHgmHn7CbveGMxyfabsZqvOt
> EWKPEaSY3/NEzY+pXRG0xc30zglkBKEltSZfpKFZMl/vuAr0J21ZxuXqxUi1BjhO
> q5NTAhtwtOBy2eZPT4dStn6sKRFeGbFg3TOmZed05DK7FXwRndZyKqq4SYDNMs8V
> zzj88aHSsdA=
> =D0y9
> -END PGP SIGNATURE-
>
> --
> D.R. Evans N7DR / G4AMJ  [EMAIL PROTECTED]
>
> "Palindor Chronicles" information and extracts:
>http://www.sff.net/people/N7DR/drevans.htp
> --

Re: [expert] Use of Windows may be hazardous to your Linux

[Brook humphrey]

The best one is ranish partition manager from dos. Just do a search for
ranish.

John Aldrich wrote:
> 
> On Thu, 20 Apr 2000, you wrote:
> > > I'm guessing you used DOS Fdisk to create the extended
> > > partition for your Linux. This is a "bad idea" (tm).  This
> > > makes Windows aware of that partition. Next time, just
> > > leave empty space at the end of your Windows drive and let
> > > Linux do the partitioning.
> > > John
> >
> > Is is ok if you let Partition Magic 4/5 do it ?
> >
> MAYBE. I'd still suggest using Linux to partition it,
> either using Linux FDISK or the nifty little util they have
> at install. What I would use PM for would be to create a
> blank area after Windows, which you can use Fdisk from
> Linux to partition. That way, Windows knows NOTHING about
> that partition and can't touch it! :-)
> John

Re: [expert] Use of Windows may be hazardous to your Linux

[John Aldrich]

On Thu, 20 Apr 2000, you wrote:
> > I'm guessing you used DOS Fdisk to create the extended
> > partition for your Linux. This is a "bad idea" (tm).  This
> > makes Windows aware of that partition. Next time, just
> > leave empty space at the end of your Windows drive and let
> > Linux do the partitioning.
> > John
> 
> Is is ok if you let Partition Magic 4/5 do it ?
> 
MAYBE. I'd still suggest using Linux to partition it,
either using Linux FDISK or the nifty little util they have
at install. What I would use PM for would be to create a
blank area after Windows, which you can use Fdisk from
Linux to partition. That way, Windows knows NOTHING about
that partition and can't touch it! :-)
John

Re: [expert] Use of Windows may be hazardous to your Linux

[John Aldrich]

On Thu, 20 Apr 2000, you wrote:
> 
> Wow! I really appreciate this posting. 
> 
> Normally I defrag my Windows junk every couple of months. Having just put 
> Linux on my brand new Win98 box, I hadn't given a moment's thought to 
> changing this practice, and fully expected to do a defrag sometime in the 
> next month or so. Now I won't!
> 
> This seems so fundamental that I'm surprised I haven't seen words to this 
> effect somewhere else. Or maybe you were just very, very (un)lucky.
> 
Doc (et al):
As long as you don't make Windows aware of the Linux
partition, (by using M$ Fdisk to create the "extended"
partition that Linux lives in) you shouldn't have a
problem. However, if you DID use Windows FDISK, I would be
EXTREMELY careful about using Defrag!
John

Re: [expert] Use of Windows may be hazardous to your Linux

[Wolfgang Bornath]

On Thu, Apr 20, 2000 at 11:25 -0400, John Aldrich wrote:
 
> I'm guessing you used DOS Fdisk to create the extended
> partition for your Linux. This is a "bad idea" (tm).  This
> makes Windows aware of that partition. Next time, just
> leave empty space at the end of your Windows drive and let
> Linux do the partitioning.
>   John

Good advice, John, but I knew that one before. I always do only
the "C:" partition with M$-fdisk. Every other partition is
created by Linux.
Next point: As you may see it was not the extended partition
which got "mugged", it was the second primary partition. That is
a sure sign that I did not set it up with M$-fdisk!

wobo
-- 
GPG-Fingerprint: FE5A 0891 7027 8D1B 4E3F  73C1 AD9B D732 A698 82EE
For Public Key mailto [EMAIL PROTECTED] with Subject: GPG-Request
---
ISDN4LINUX-FAQ -- Deutsch: http://www.wolf-b.de/i4l/i4lfaq-de.html

Re: [expert] Use of Windows may be hazardous to your Linux

[Daniel Woods]

> I'm guessing you used DOS Fdisk to create the extended
> partition for your Linux. This is a "bad idea" (tm).  This
> makes Windows aware of that partition. Next time, just
> leave empty space at the end of your Windows drive and let
> Linux do the partitioning.
>   John

Is is ok if you let Partition Magic 4/5 do it ?

Thanks... Dan.

Re: [expert] Use of Windows may be hazardous to your Linux

[Lyndon Lininger Sr.]

I've never had a problem on a dual boot system with defraging the windows
partitions. You must have been very unlucky or your hard drive got flaky.

Lyndon Lininger Sr.

- Original Message -
From: "D. R. Evans" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Sent: Thursday, April 20, 2000 10:54 AM
Subject: Re: [expert] Use of Windows may be hazardous to your Linux


> -BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-
>
> On 20 Apr 00, at 14:33, Wolfgang Bornath wrote:
>
>
> > What happened? Windows defrag destroyed the superblock of
> > primary partition /dev/hda2 although it was told to just defrag
> > "C:"! The other partitions where untouched and without errors.
> >
>
> Wow! I really appreciate this posting.
>
> Normally I defrag my Windows junk every couple of months. Having just put
> Linux on my brand new Win98 box, I hadn't given a moment's thought to
> changing this practice, and fully expected to do a defrag sometime in the
> next month or so. Now I won't!
>
> This seems so fundamental that I'm surprised I haven't seen words to this
> effect somewhere else. Or maybe you were just very, very (un)lucky.
>
>   Doc Evans
>
>
> -BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-
> Version: PGP 6.0.2 -- QDPGP 2.60
> Comment: Key obtainable from servers: ID 0x6184B81D
>
> iQCVAwUBOP8oG/2CFbFhhLgdAQGRvgQAi/cC4jODxHgmHn7CbveGMxyfabsZqvOt
> EWKPEaSY3/NEzY+pXRG0xc30zglkBKEltSZfpKFZMl/vuAr0J21ZxuXqxUi1BjhO
> q5NTAhtwtOBy2eZPT4dStn6sKRFeGbFg3TOmZed05DK7FXwRndZyKqq4SYDNMs8V
> zzj88aHSsdA=
> =D0y9
> -END PGP SIGNATURE-
>
> --
> D.R. Evans N7DR / G4AMJ  [EMAIL PROTECTED]
>
> "Palindor Chronicles" information and extracts:
>http://www.sff.net/people/N7DR/drevans.htp
> --

Re: [expert] Use of Windows may be hazardous to your Linux

[D. R. Evans]

-BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-

On 20 Apr 00, at 14:33, Wolfgang Bornath wrote:


> What happened? Windows defrag destroyed the superblock of
> primary partition /dev/hda2 although it was told to just defrag
> "C:"! The other partitions where untouched and without errors.
> 

Wow! I really appreciate this posting. 

Normally I defrag my Windows junk every couple of months. Having just put 
Linux on my brand new Win98 box, I hadn't given a moment's thought to 
changing this practice, and fully expected to do a defrag sometime in the 
next month or so. Now I won't!

This seems so fundamental that I'm surprised I haven't seen words to this 
effect somewhere else. Or maybe you were just very, very (un)lucky.

  Doc Evans


-BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-
Version: PGP 6.0.2 -- QDPGP 2.60 
Comment: Key obtainable from servers: ID 0x6184B81D

iQCVAwUBOP8oG/2CFbFhhLgdAQGRvgQAi/cC4jODxHgmHn7CbveGMxyfabsZqvOt
EWKPEaSY3/NEzY+pXRG0xc30zglkBKEltSZfpKFZMl/vuAr0J21ZxuXqxUi1BjhO
q5NTAhtwtOBy2eZPT4dStn6sKRFeGbFg3TOmZed05DK7FXwRndZyKqq4SYDNMs8V
zzj88aHSsdA=
=D0y9
-END PGP SIGNATURE-

--
D.R. Evans N7DR / G4AMJ  [EMAIL PROTECTED]

"Palindor Chronicles" information and extracts:
   http://www.sff.net/people/N7DR/drevans.htp
--

Re: [expert] Use of Windows may be hazardous to your Linux

[John Aldrich]

On Thu, 20 Apr 2000, you wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> My WIndows98 has done it again!
> 
> 
> Yesterday I booted into Windows to look at my bankaccount. Being
> there I thought it a good idea to defrag "C:" (/dev/hda1) as I
> was told to do so every now and then.
> Checked the options of defrag, told the program to work on "C:"
> and nowhere else, started the app and went to bed.
> This morning the screen told me that defrag had done its task
> without errors. I closed Windows and booted into Linux -- I
> tried to boot into Linux!
> The boot process (via LILO) started normal but somewhere before
> entering interactive mode it hanged. The first time I had to hit
> the reset button since I use Linux!
> Booting with a floppy revealed that there was no /boot on
> /dev/hda2.
[snip]
> What happened? Windows defrag destroyed the superblock of
> primary partition /dev/hda2 although it was told to just defrag
> "C:"! The other partitions where untouched and without errors.
> 
I'm guessing you used DOS Fdisk to create the extended
partition for your Linux. This is a "bad idea" (tm).  This
makes Windows aware of that partition. Next time, just
leave empty space at the end of your Windows drive and let
Linux do the partitioning.
John