[Novalug] Device naming.

Alan Grimes agrimes@speakeasy.net
Mon Mar 15 18:09:45 EDT 2010


Peter Larsen wrote:
> On Mon, 2010-03-15 at 11:04 -0400, Alan Grimes wrote:

> Yes - use LVM and not partitions.

Okay, it seems you simply mean extended partitions, OK... =P

> Another good reason then. You've already identified many of the pitfalls
> of partitions. Why not break that barrier and make life easier?

You know what? I've not had to give partitions any thought in many a
long year. I'm happy with that...

Going forward, I'm going to have to pick a size for the partitions on my
new machine, that's giving me a minor headache, but I'm not up in arms
about it.

>> /me recites his mantra

>> SHOW ME THE DOCS!!!
>> GIVE ME LINKS!!!!
>> GIVE ME GOOGLE SEARCH TERMS THAT WILL FIND THE DOCS IN THE FIRST TEN
>> RESULTS!!!

> Who cares? It doesn't matter if you get the docs or not. You've already
> made up your mind, and you've clearly stated you refuse to read or learn
> about anything that your preconceived mind has already decided it's
> opinion about. And the documentation and references you've been given
> you've ignored.

I've looked at the docs that people have linked to. They don't cover the
subjects that I need to understand in order to have any peace of mind.

> Instead you behave like we owe it to you to solve your problems. And
> because we don't, you get angry at us and at the world. I think most of
> us here subscribe to the mantra, that it's better to teach a man to
> fish, than give him one. In that kind of world, if you don't like how to
> fish, you'll starve. And from your utterings here, I'm sure you'll
> starve blaming everyone else in the process. 

=P
That's silly...
Who do you think changed all these things that used to work for me for
many many years. -- Hint: I didn't do it to myself! =P

> Ohh like you retreat to throwing out empty postulates and unfounded
> accusations? 

It's not like I have any documentation to work from...

>> Then how does it know what partition has my programs and which has my
>> anime?

> You still haven't read any of the pages you've been pointed to? udev
> rules defines what disk is what - or even better the label/uuid. Kudzu
> NEVER had anything to do with that anyway.

That's insane!
It's a whole other layer of configuration complexity. Here's a bargain:
You get me a reliable device naming scheme and I'll plug it into my
directory tree using fstab. If I ever have to change it again before I
die, I'm going to be out for blood. =|

> You know, I still have an MSDOS 6.22 ISO here that I'll share with you.
> You could "upgrade" your system and stick with it from now on. I think
> you would save us all a lot of grief and time if you did. I'm beginning
> to doubt you even use computers at a regular basis; being linux or
> windows or anything else. You would know, that one of the biggest
> complaints from the Windows side is the "c:" limitations.

I have never uttered such a complaint, nor have I ever heard an argument
behind such a complaint.

I got me an XP install that decided to install itself on E:. =\

> While windows has had mount-points for quite a while, it's rarely used or understood
> by windows admins. But it's there because IT MATTERS and makes life
> simpler.

No.
It's merely different.

> With linux you have one tree. That's it! No worrying about what device
> your files are on. Programs are simpler; paths are simpler. 

In a number of cases, I care very much which physical medium my data is
on. -- especially when planning my allocation of storage, making sure I
am taking the right data with me if I decide to unplug a drive, etc...

The way I see it, I have to do more work on linux to manage physical
volumes than I do on DOS.

>> Because xorg ignores my console keyboard settings, there's no way for it
>> to know that I'm a dvorak typist unless I tell it explicitly.
>> Furthermore, it's default swaps the physical locations of my monitors.
>> Both issues must be fixed manually.

> Again, they didn't take away the functionality of xorg.conf; it's simply
> made so it's simpler to approach now. Nobody has to read xorg.conf man
> pages just to get the keyboard connected.

That's a crock of bull, see below.

>> Furthermore, the xorg penguins have lost their heads just as the udev
>> penguins have and, unless you basically shout at them in xorg.conf, they
>> will ignore what you wrote there and lock you into a desktop with no
>> keyboard or mouse input!!! There is supposed to be some kind of
>> autodetection involving HAL but since

>> -- A: I don't need anything HAL does.
>> -- B: I don't know how HAL works.
>> and
>> -- C: HAL is probably not documented just as most of the kernel and the
>> rest of the system is not documented,
> 
> "probably" huh? You'll find that open source are some of the best
> documented systems out there.

SHOW ME THE DOCS.
SHOW ME THE DOCS.
SHOW ME THE DOCS.

> At the very least you have access to the
> source if everything else fails. The kernel most of all. But without
> understanding the underlying technologies of a kernel, it's not going to
> be understood by you. No level of explanations or links will fix that.

I have half a dozen nice thick textbooks on the theoretical
underpinnings of operating system design. =|

I even wanted to develop my own operating system. I even designed it but
couldn't implement it because I couldn't find documentation on compilers
and linkers, the shifting sands of PC architecture, and a few other issues.

>> I therefore removed and masked HAL from my system, and done everything I
>> can think of to force xorg to basically behave as TRON did at the IO tower.

> I'm beginning to think that sending you that DOS 6.22 ISO may actually
> not work. It's not floppies and I have a feeling you've thrown out CD
> drives and USB devices taking more than 1.44MB at a time.

Xine connects to my DVD drive directly and when I need to mount it, I su
and mount it manually. There doesn't appear to be any other way to use
linux. =(

> Find me an IDE (not SATA) disk, and I'll give you a reward. You're
> killing your own argument though. If the premise is the computer already
> has a working primary drive, you're assuming it's configured correct
> already. That means that any additional drive automatically will be
> assigned to sdb, sdc etc. You can do a lot of assumptions going in. And
> if you're adding the second drive, you can easily tell your dummy to do
> an pvcreate /dev/sdb and vgextend. Doing that does ALL the UUID for you.
> Never have to be concerned or update /etc/fstab or anything. Neat huh?

I've never heard of either of those tools.

Again,

-- Because I don't need any of those features.
-- Because I have complete understanding of how classical partitions
work, right down to the binary representation on the drive.

--->>> I'll continue to use cfdisk. =|

>> In the new system you must first *GUESS* (with scant evidence) which of
>> the sd* devices your new drive is, and then adjust all of your plans
>> accordingly. If the new drive displaced other drives in the system,
>> you're SCREWED.... You have to go back and figure out where all of your
>> drives are again and adjust your fstab accordingly.

> No fstab change needed - unless you want to introduce new mount points.
> Again, learn how to use the tools that are there to make things easier
> for you. 

What about the new drive? How will it be mounted (the mount point would
be provided in the though experiment).

>> SHOW ME THE DOCS!!!
>> I need to know exactly how it works, with no detail omitted.

> You've been given the links over and over again. You refuse, and have
> described CLEARLY that you're not interested in learning how things are
> done now. You want things to work like they did in the 1980s - well,
> you'll need a time-machine for that, and not even Linux can help you
> there I'm sorry to say.

I'm open to change, I merely demand that I

A: understand the new solution equally as well as I did the previous
solution.
B: Find it actually to be preferable. -- Ie genuinely reduces my workload.

> Redundant. We've even thrown you a few fish but you still don't seem to
> want to eat because the fish doesn't look exactly like the fish you ate
> when you were 5 ... or so to speak.

If I don't know enough to open a C compiler and rewrite it, I'll never
trust it. =|

> Case in point. You get flamed because you start out flaming, complaining
> and lecturing when you obviously haven't got a clue. Ask a question, "be
> nice". A simple: "I used to be able to easily know what my device nodes
> were named/called to represent my hardware, but I'm unable to do that
> with XYZ release of Linux - can anyone help me on what to do" would have
> given you 10x the response you got, and all would have been
> constructive. Instead you spread your poison and bad vibes by accusing a
> whole community of "conspiracy" to just get back at you.

I'm sick to death of being sent back to square 1 with linux. =|

If you understood how I really felt, you would marvel at my self restraint.

> You even sent it to the kernel community as if they were in charge of
the conspiracy
> and you single handed had lured them and their dirty tricks. 

Because I have no documentation, I don't know where these changes
started from so I made my best guess.


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