Baslinux mailing list

[James Miller <jamtat AT mailsnare.net>]

On Tue, 30 Dec 2003, Sindi Keesan wrote:

> Why do you say that we cannot copy the contents of hda3 (current linux
> partition on an 8G hard drive) to hdb (only partition on a 400MB second
> hard drive on the same controller) but only to hdb1 or hdb2 etc.?  Are
> hard drives always numbered even if there is only one on the controller?

Well, let me venture an answer on Steven's behalf.  He'll be able to
correct any mistakes I may make.  hdb (or hdx) is the name for the entire
physical disk.  But for it to be actually useable to the OS, it must have
a filesystem on it, and in order to have a filesystem, it must have a
partition.  Agreed?  When you add partitions (so that you can create
filesystems) is when the numbers start getting added to the hdx.  If you
have one partition on the drive in question, it will be hdb1; if 2 you
will have hdb1 and hdb2 (unless you made an extended partition: these
start numbering at 5 [e.g., hdb5]).  So I think what Steven is saying is
that you have to create a partition with a filesystem on it to transfer
the data you want to transfer: hence you can copy to hdb1 (2, 3, 4, 5,
etc), but not to hdb.  Does it make sense?

James