Diskettes and Volume Management
When you insert a diskette into the diskette drive, volume management does not mount the diskette automatically; this prevents excessive reads, which can quickly wear out the diskette drive. You must use the volcheck command or choose a menu option that checks for the presence of a diskette in the diskette drive.
Formatting Diskettes
You can format diskettes in three ways.
With Removable Media Manager.
With the fdformat command.
With the rmformat command.
 | Using Removable Media Manager to Format Diskettes |
You can use the Removable Media Manager graphical user interface to create the following formats and file systems on a diskette.
PCFS (DOS).
UFS (UNIX).
UDFS.
NEC DOS.
You can format an unformatted diskette or reformat a formatted diskette.
CAUTION
Reformatting a diskette destroys any existing data on the diskette.
Use the following steps to format a diskette with Removable Media Manager.
1. |
Insert the diskette you want to format in the diskette drive. |
2. |
Choose Open Floppy from the CDE Front Panel Files menu or, in a Terminal window, type volcheck and press Return. The command checks the diskette drive and mounts a formatted diskette, if found. If volume management finds an unformatted diskette in the drive, the diskette is not mounted. Instead, it is made visible as a raw device to the Removable Media Manager, as indicated by the (...unformatted) message and a dash (-) instead of the normal number used to indicate which instance of the diskette is mounted. |
3. |
From the CDE Front Panel Files menu, choose Removable Media Manager. The Removable Media Manager window opens and displays any mounted media on the system. In the example shown in Figure 109, an unformatted diskette is the only available media. Figure 109. Removable Media Manager Window
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4. |
Click on the diskette icon. The diskette is highlighted to show that you selected it. |
5. |
From the Selected menu, choose Format. The Media Format window is displayed, as shown in Figure 110. Figure 110. Removable Media Manager Media Format Window
|
6. |
Choose the file system type from the File System Type menu. |
7. |
(Optional) Type a label in the Volume Label field if you want to assign a name to the device. |
8. |
Click on the Format button. The diskette icon is removed from the Removable Media Manager window, and the Format button in the Format window is dimmed. No other status information is displayed while the diskette is formatting. When the diskette is formatted, a notice is displayed, as shown in Figure 111. Figure 111. Notice of Successful Formatting
The icon in the Removable Media Manager window is updated to show the new format and volume name (if assigned), as shown in Figure 112. |
Using the fdformat Command to Format Diskettes
You can use the fdformat command to format a UFS or MS-DOS file system on a diskette.
Use the following steps to format a diskette with the fdformat command.
1. |
Insert a diskette into the diskette drive. |
2. |
Type volcheck and press Return. The system has access to the unformatted diskette. |
3. |
To format an MS-DOS file system, type fdformat -d and press Return. If you want to create a UFS file system on the diskette at a later time, type fdformat and press Return. |
4. |
When prompted, type y and press Return to begin formatting the diskette. |
Use the following commands to create a UFS file system on a formatted diskette.
Become superuser.
Type newfs /vol/dev/rdiskette0/unnammed_floppy and press Return.
 | Using the rmformat Command to Format Diskettes |
Starting with the Solaris 8 06/00 release, you can use the rmformat command to format removable media, including the following types of diskettes.
Double-density—720 Kbytes (3.5 inch).
High-density—1.44 Mbytes (3.5 inch).
The rmformat command can format and protect rewritable removable media without requiring superuser privileges. It has the following formatting options.
quick— Format removable media without certification or with limited certification of certain tracks on the media.
long— Format removable media completely. For some devices, this might include the certification of the whole media by the drive itself.
force— Format completely without confirmation. For media with password protection, clear the password before formatting. This feature is useful when you have forgotten or do not know the password. On media without password protection, this option forces a long format.
NOTE
At the time of writing, the rmformat command has numerous reported bugs. This author was unable to get any of the following examples to work.
Use the following steps to format a diskette from a command line.
1. |
Insert a diskette into the diskette drive. |
2. |
Type rmformat -F [quick | long | force]
device-name and press Return. |
3. |
When prompted, type y and press Return to begin formatting the diskette. |
Use the following commands to create a UFS file system on a formatted diskette.
Become superuser.
Type newfs /vol/dev/rdiskette0/unnamed_floppy and press Return.
Diskette Command-Line Access
Use the following steps to access files on a formatted diskette.
1. |
Insert a formatted diskette in the diskette drive. |
2. |
Type volcheck and press Return. If there is a formatted diskette in the drive, volume management mounts it on the /floppy mount point. If no diskette is in the drive, no error message is displayed. The volcheck command redisplays the prompt. Once the diskette is mounted on the /floppy mount point, you can access files on it either from the command line or from the File Manager Floppy window, which is described in “Diskette CDE File Manager Access”. |
3. |
Type cd /floppy and press Return. |
4. |
Type ls and press Return. The name of the diskette is displayed as the name of a directory. |
5. |
Type cd
diskette-name and press Return. |
6. |
Type ls and press Return. The names of the files on the diskette are displayed. You can copy files to and from the diskette with the cp command. |
In the following example, the diskette is not mounted, so the only directory in /floppy is ms-dos_5, which is the name of the last mounted diskette. After volcheck mounts the diskette, the directory with the name of the diskette is displayed. The diskette in this example contains only a lost+found directory.
oak% cd /floppy oak% ls ms-dos_5 oak% volcheck oak% ls ms-dos_5 unnamed_floppy oak% cd unnamed_floppy oak% ls lost+found oak% cp /home/winsor/Appx/appxA.doc . oak% ls appxA.doc lost+found oak%
You cannot unmount a file system when that file system is in use by any process. If you get the message Device busy, a process may have its current working directory on the diskette, or some process has opened a file on the diskette. Use the fuser command to find out what processes are using the diskette. See the fuser(1M) manual page for information.
 | If you have more than one media device connected to the system, you may need to specify the device name to the eject command. If you are not sure which device name to use, you can display device names for all removable media devices with the eject -n command, as shown in the following example. |
paperbark% eject -n
fd -> floppy0
fd0 -> floppy0
fd1 -> floppy1
diskette -> floppy0
diskette0 -> floppy0
diskette1 -> floppy1
rdiskette -> floppy0
rdiskette0 -> floppy0
rdiskette1 -> floppy1
cd -> cdrom0
cd0 -> cdrom0
cd1 -> cdrom1
sr -> cdrom0
sr0 -> cdrom0
/dev/sr0 -> cdrom0
/dev/rsr0 -> cdrom0
cdrom0 -> /vol/dev/rdsk/c0t6d0/sol_8_doc
paperbark%
Use the following steps to eject the diskette.
1. |
Type cd and press Return. You have changed out of the /floppy directory. |
2. |
Type eject [device-name] and press Return. After a few seconds, the diskette is ejected from the drive.  On systems with diskette drives with an eject button, a message is displayed telling you that it's OK to manually eject the diskette from the drive. |
Diskette CDE Front Panel Access
If you are running CDE, you can use the Folders menu on the front panel to display the contents of a diskette. Follow these steps to open a diskette from the front panel.
1. |
Insert a formatted or unformatted diskette into the diskette drive. |
2. |
From the front panel, open the Folders menu, shown in Figure 113, and click on Open Floppy. Figure 113. The Front Panel Folders Menu
|
3. |
After the light on the CDE front panel stops flashing (about five to ten seconds), the floppy is mounted to /floppy and a File Manager window opens. Figure 114 shows an example of the File Manager Floppy window for a formatted floppy. Figure 114. The CDE File Manager Floppy Window
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Diskette CDE File Manager Access
If you are running CDE File Manager, you can use it to format a diskette, display the contents, and copy files to and from the diskette. Follow these steps to open a diskette from the CDE File Manager.
1. | Insert a formatted or unformatted diskette into the diskette drive. |
2. | From the File Manager File menu, shown in Figure 115, choose Open Floppy. After the light on the CDE front panel stops flashing (about five to ten seconds), the floppy is mounted to /floppy and a File Manager window opens. Figure 115. The CDE File Manager Menu
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3. | From the File Manager File menu note that you can also format, rename, and eject the diskette by clicking on the respective options. |
Using the tar and cpio Commands with Diskettes
If a diskette contains a tar or cpio data stream (or archive) instead of a file system, volume management does not mount it. You cannot access raw data on the diskette from the old /dev/rdiskette device name because volume management provides access to the file system (if present) written on the diskette, not to raw diskette device itself.
You can access tar and cpio data streams that are written on a diskette by using the symbolic link to the character device for the media that is in floppy drive 0, as shown in the following example.
/vol/dev/aliases/floppy0
Use the following steps to copy a file into a tar archive that is written as a raw data stream on a diskette.
1. |
Insert a formatted diskette into the diskette drive. |
2. |
Type volcheck and press Return. |
3. |
Type tar cvf /vol/dev/aliases/floppy0
filename and press Return. The file is copied to the diskette. |
4. |
Type eject [device-name] and press Return. After a few seconds, the diskette is ejected.  On systems with diskette drives with an eject button, a message is displayed telling you that it's OK to manually eject the diskette from the drive. |
Use the following steps to extract all files contained in a raw tar archive data stream from a diskette into the current directory.
1. |
Insert the diskette containing your tar archive into the diskette drive. |
2. |
Change to the directory where you want to put the files. |
3. |
Type volcheck and press Return. The diskette is now available for raw access because it has no file system written on it. |
4. |
Type tar xvf /vol/dev/aliases/floppy0 and press Return. The files are extracted from the tar archive data stream on the diskette. |
5. |
Type eject [device-name] and press Return. After a few seconds, the diskette is ejected.  On systems with diskette drives with an eject button, a message is displayed telling you that it's OK to manually eject the diskette from the drive.Alternatively, with Solaris 2.2 (and later) systems, you can access tar or cpio files with the following device name syntax. |
/vol/dev/rfd0/media-name
The most common media-name is unlabeled.
Starting with the Solaris 2.3 release, the device name syntax is changed. You access tar or cpio files with the following device name syntax.
/vol/dev/rdiskette0/media-name
The most frequent media-name for media without a file system is unlabeled.
For example, to create a tar archive data stream on a diskette, type tar cvf /vol/dev/rdiskette0/unlabeled filename and press Return. To extract all the files contained in the tar archive data stream on a diskette and put these files in the current directory, type tar xvf /vol/dev/rdiskette0/unlabeled and press Return.
 | Accessing Jaz or Zip Drives |
You can connect Iomega USB Jaz or Zip drives to systems that have a USB port. If you connected a Jaz or Zip drive to a system with the Solaris 7 or Solaris 8 release and have upgraded the system to the Solaris 8 6/00 release, users can continue to access Jaz and Zip drives the same way as in previous releases.
If you are freshly installing the Solaris 8 6/00 release, you must use the following procedure to access a Jaz or Zip drive in the same way as previous releases.
1. |
Become superuser. |
2. |
Edit the /etc/vold.conf file and comment out the rmdisk drive line, as shown below. # use rmdisk drive /dev/rdsk/c*s2 dev_rmdisk.so rmdisk%d |
3. |
Type init 6 and press Return. The system reboots. |
NOTE
If the system has the Solaris 8 10/00 or Solaris 8 01/01 release installed, Jaz or Zip drives do not work. At the time of writing, no workaround exists. These problems are fixed in the Solaris 8 04/01 release.
See “Using the rmformat Command to Format Diskettes” for instructions on how to use the rmformat command to format Jaz or Zip disks. You can also use Removable Media Manager to format Jaz or Zip disks. The procedure is similar to formatting diskettes. See “Using Removable Media Manager to Format Diskettes” for more information.
To access information on a Jaz or Zip drive insert a disk into the drive. The file systems on the drive are mounted and a File Manager window opens showing the contents, as shown in Figure 116.
Figure 116. File Manager Window with Mounted Zip Disk File Systems
You can also access the file systems on a Zip or Jaz drive from the command line with the following steps.
1. |
Type ls /rmdisk and press Return. The contents of the /rmdisk drive are displayed. |
2. |
Type cd /rmdisk/zip or cd /rmdisk/jaz and press Return. The file systems on the Zip or Jaz drive are displayed. The following example shows the contents of a Zip disk |
mopoke% ls /rmdisk zip zip0 mopoke% cd /rmdisk/zip mopoke% ls ___Move&Rename Mail Folder Eudora Nicknames TheFindByContentFolder mopoke%
You can also use the Removable Media Manager to format, protect, and view data on removable media devices. See “Removable Media Manager” for more information.
Creating An Alternate fdisk Partition
You can create an fdisk partition and a PCFS file system on removable media such as diskettes, Zip, or Jaz disks on a SPARC-based system to facilitate data transfers to IA-based systems.
Use the following steps to format removable media for a PCFS file system and create an alternate fdisk partition.
NOTE
If you want to create a PCFS file system without an fdisk partition, skip step 4.
1. |
Type rmformat -F quick
device-name and press Return. |
2. |
When prompted, type y and press Return. The disk is formatted. |
3. |
Become superuser. |
4. |
Type fdisk
device-name and press Return. |
5. |
Type mkfs -F pcfs
device-name and press Return. |
6. |
When prompted, type y and press Return. A new FAT file system is created in the specified partition. |
The following example creates an alternate fdisk partition on /dev/rdsk/c0t4d0s2:c.
paperbark% rmformat -F quick /dev/rdsk/c0t4d0s2:c Formatting will erase all the data on disk. Do you want to continue? (y/n) y paperbark% su Password: # fdisk /dev/rdsk/c0t4d0s2:c # mkfs -F pcfs /dev/rdsk/c0t4d0s2:c Construct a new FAT file system on /dev/rdsk/c0t4d0s2:c (y/n)? y #