I think I copied a file over my entire Windows partition

jiml8 · 05-22-2007, 09:08 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Quakeboy02

Wow! Looks like filesystems have come a long way since I looked at FAT and UDF.

NTFS is actually a pretty solid system. It's major defect (IMO) is that it will fragment quite easily. It tolerates a lot of corruption before it goes down, and it has sufficient redundancy that if you take some minor pains to maintain it (run chkdsk periodically) it'll hold up forever.

Of course, any filesystem at all is subject to corruption; the problem with NTFS is that Windows doesn't periodically check it - unless, that is, Windows finds itself unable to start.

Linux (and pretty much every other OS in existence) does routinely schedule filesystem checks.

Matir · 05-22-2007, 09:15 PM

Journaling is a big help. NTFS is not a bad filesystem, though I think it's a little slow and bloated.

jiml8 · 05-22-2007, 09:16 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Matir

Copying data directly to a device is certainly possible. All 'dd' does is open it like any other file.

Without ever giving it much consideration, it had been my belief that command line tools that did reading and writing to a drive did it explicitly through the filesystem. Actually, I would certainly expect this.

In this case, one would expect any attempts to read or write any /dev would fail because there would be no filesystem attached.

Within this framework, dd would represent a different, lower level tool which accessed a device at the hardware level, bypassing all filesystems and accessing the kernel level driver that actually talks to the device ports. In this context, dd is pretty smart in terms of deciding whether or not it should talk to a filesystem (is my input or output a file, or a raw device?). I certainly would expect it to use very different drivers (and some significantly different logic) depending on whether or not it was dealing with a filesystem.

transparent9 · 05-22-2007, 09:18 PM

Ok, here's yet another update. I've run a repair install from the Windows install CD, and now my Windows seems to boot fine, and all my settings and files seem to be intact.

Ubuntu still doesn't see the partition, showing "vmware tools" as a volume instead.

Output from "sudo fdisk -l"

Code:

 
sudo fdisk -l
Password:

Disk /dev/sda: 30.0 GB, 30020272128 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 3649 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes

   Device Boot      Start         End      Blocks   Id  System
/dev/sda1   *           1        2432    19535008+   7  HPFS/NTFS
/dev/sda2            2433        3649     9775552+   5  Extended
/dev/sda5            2433        3551     8988336   83  Linux
/dev/sda6            3552        3649      787153+  82  Linux swap / Solaris

Disk /dev/sdb: 250.0 GB, 250059350016 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 30401 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes

   Device Boot      Start         End      Blocks   Id  System
/dev/sdb1               1       30401   244196001   83  Linux

and from "cat /etc/fstab"

Code:

cat /etc/fstab
# /etc/fstab: static file system information.
#
#  -- This file has been automaticly generated by ntfs-config -- 
#
# <file system> <mount point>   <type>  <options>       <dump>  <pass>

proc /proc proc defaults 0 0
# Entry for /dev/sda5 :
UUID=4d76fc56-b2ca-4816-92d0-2ad52d957433 / ext3 defaults,errors=remount-ro 0 1
# Entry for /dev/ !! UNKNOW DEVICE !! :
UUID=9AB8DFE4B8DFBD47 /media/sda1 ntfs-3g defaults,locale=en_US.UTF-8 0 1
# Entry for /dev/sdb1 :
UUID=13439e46-de8a-4ab6-a9e8-b66451974c41 /media/sdb1 ext3 defaults 0 2
# Entry for /dev/sda6 :
UUID=13285d7d-1bfd-4728-a901-4de82ce2a03b none swap sw 0 0
/dev/scd0 /media/cdrom0 udf,iso9660 user,noauto 0 0
/dev/fd0 /media/floppy0 auto rw,user,noauto 0 0

I'm not familiar with fstab, so I'm not sure what to do from here. If I edit the file to correct the second entry where it says "!! UNKNOW DEVICE !!" will that let my partition show up properly?

Thanks again everyone for all the help, I'm surprised I was able to recover anything at all!

syg00 · 05-22-2007, 09:38 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by transparent9

I'm not familiar with fstab, so I'm not sure what to do from here. If I edit the file to correct the second entry where it says "!! UNKNOW DEVICE !!" will that let my partition show up properly?

Should do; try this (clean up that comment while you're there)

Code:

/media/sda1 ntfs-3g defaults,locale=en_US.UTF-8 0 1

Matir · 05-22-2007, 09:48 PM

I believe syg00 meant:

Code:

/dev/sda1 /media/sda1 ntfs-3g defaults,locale=en_US.UTF-8 0 1

syg00 · 05-22-2007, 09:56 PM

Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear...

thank you Matir

jiml8 · 05-22-2007, 09:58 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Matir

I believe syg00 meant:

Code:

/dev/sda1 /media/sda1 ntfs-3g defaults,locale=en_US.UTF-8 0 1

No, that can't be right. At least, it isn't consistent with the rest of the HD entries in fstab, all of which start with UUID=blahblah.

I'm thinking that the string EN_US.UTF-8 is wrong; the period should be either a comma or a space (not sure which).

transparent9 · 05-22-2007, 10:04 PM

Ok, so I've made the edit, and rebooted. Good news! Now, when I click on the "vmware tools" volume, I get the files in my Windows partition!

However, when I look at the volume properties, ubuntu reports the drive as having the joliet filesystem from the iso.

Do I just edit this information using the hardware information applet for ubuntu? This applet shows lots of fields that seem editable. As long as I'm asking, where would I go to change the same of "sdb1" to something more descriptive, like "music" or "documents"?

Or is there another place I should be making the changes, or a tool that I should be using? Also, does it matter that all the other entries use UUIDs except that one I added that says /dev/sda1?

I'm sorry if these are really basic questions, but I'm a little wary of experimenting now... especially when it comes down to the lower level volume/partition stuff. Thanks!

Matir · 05-22-2007, 10:48 PM

No, it's not consistent. But the UUID seemed to be that of the CD, not the NTFS partition. That uses the classic notation, but it can move around if the hard drives are adjusted (new ones added, chains changed, etc.)

I would think that fdisk could change the partition type back to NTFS. Be careful, of course, fdisk can also fsck your partition table.

transparent9 · 05-22-2007, 11:31 PM

Oh, I forgot to mention, parted and testdisk show the filesystem type as NTFS.

Emerson · 05-23-2007, 08:06 AM

Never mind, had an idea about udev but it seems to be wrong.

transparent9 · 05-23-2007, 11:46 AM

So before I give up and reinstall ubuntu... I just wanted to find out a few things.

Where does ubuntu get the information for the hard drives when you pull up the Device Manager (System -> Preferences -> Hardware Information)? This appears to be the same information that shows up when you right click a volume and choose "properties".

Is there any way to get ubuntu to re-detect all the hard drives on the system, like if it was installing for the first time?

What would happen if I deleted /etc/fstab? Would that get the OS to re-detect things?

When I try to use:

Code:

sudo tune2fs -l /dev/sda1

to get the volume's UUID, it says:

Code:

tune2fs 1.40-WIP (14-Nov-2006)
tune2fs: Bad magic number in super-block while trying to open /dev/sda1
Couldn't find valid filesystem superblock.

Is that a clue as to what's actually wrong here? The partition seems to be in working shape, I can boot Windows and all parted, fdisk, and testdisk report the filesystem to be NTFS/HPFS.

Emerson · 05-23-2007, 12:05 PM

Deleting fstab will kill your Linux. There are two daemons: HAL and D-BUS dealing with your hardware and automounting. I do not use them myself (I like to keep my system static), thus cannot tell you what exactly you have to do to reset HAL. tune2fs is an ext3 filesystem utility, it won't work on NTFS. You can definitely mount your Windows partition at startup simply by adding manually a line to the fstab.

transparent9 · 05-23-2007, 03:06 PM

Ok, now I'm at a loss...

I just reinstalled ubuntu, formatting the ubuntu partition (/dev/sda5), but this new install still sees my NTFS partition as "vmware tools" and as a joliet filesystem!

Where is the system getting this information?

I even rewrote the MBR on the disk using Windows' fixmbr command.

Here's current output of my fstab:

Code:

# /etc/fstab: static file system information.
#
# <file system> <mount point>   <type>  <options>       <dump>  <pass>
proc            /proc           proc    defaults        0       0
# /dev/sda5
UUID=55de19e2-f42e-429c-a348-c6bacefe4643 /               ext3    defaults,errors=remount-ro 0       1
/dev/sda1       /media/sda1     ntfs    defaults,nls=utf8,umask=007,gid=46 0       1
# /dev/sdb1
UUID=13439e46-de8a-4ab6-a9e8-b66451974c41 /media/sdb1     ext3    defaults        0       2
# /dev/sda6
UUID=13285d7d-1bfd-4728-a901-4de82ce2a03b none            swap    sw              0       0
/dev/scd0       /media/cdrom0   udf,iso9660 user,noauto     0       0
/dev/fd0        /media/floppy0  auto    rw,user,noauto  0       0

It appears that a reinstall did not reset anything, there's still no UUID.

Any ideas on where to go from here?