disklabel man page on 4.4BSD

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DISKLABEL(8)		  BSD System Manager's Manual		  DISKLABEL(8)

NAME
     disklabel — read and write disk pack label

SYNOPSIS
     disklabel [-r] disk
     disklabel -w [-r] disk disktype [packid]
     disklabel -e [-r] disk
     disklabel -R [-r] disk protofile
     disklabel [-NW] disk

     disklabel -B [-b boot1 [-s boot2]] disk [disktype]
     disklabel -w -B [-b boot1 [-s boot2]] disk disktype [packid]
     disklabel -R -B [-b boot1 [-s boot2]] disk protofile [disktype]

DESCRIPTION
     Disklabel can be used to install, examine or modify the label on a disk
     drive or pack.  When writing the label, it can be used to change the
     drive identification, the disk partitions on the drive, or to replace a
     damaged label.  On some systems, disklabel can be used to install boot‐
     strap code as well.  There are several forms of the command that read
     (display), install or edit the label on a disk.  Each form has an addi‐
     tional option, -r, which causes the label to be read from or written to
     the disk directly, rather than going through the system's in-core copy of
     the label.	 This option may allow a label to be installed on a disk with‐
     out kernel support for a label, such as when labels are first installed
     on a system; it must be used when first installing a label on a disk.
     The specific effect of -r is described under each command.	 The read and
     install forms also support the -B option to install bootstrap code.
     These variants are described later.

     The first form of the command (read) is used to examine the label on the
     named disk drive (e.g. sd0 or /dev/rsd0c).	 It will display all of the
     parameters associated with the drive and its partition layout.  Unless
     the -r flag is given, the kernel's in-core copy of the label is dis‐
     played; if the disk has no label, or the partition types on the disk are
     incorrect, the kernel may have constructed or modified the label.	If the
     -r flag is given, the label from the raw disk will be displayed rather
     than the in-core label.

     The second form of the command, with the -w flag, is used to write a
     standard label on the designated drive.  The required arguments to
     disklabel are the drive to be labelled (e.g. sd0), and the drive type as
     described in the disktab(5) file.	The drive parameters and partitions
     are taken from that file.	If different disks of the same physical type
     are to have different partitions, it will be necessary to have separate
     disktab entries describing each, or to edit the label after installation
     as described below.  The optional argument is a pack identification
     string, up to 16 characters long.	The pack id must be quoted if it con‐
     tains blanks.  If the -r flag is given, the disk sectors containing the
     label and bootstrap will be written directly.  A side-effect of this is
     that any existing bootstrap code will be overwritten and the disk ren‐
     dered unbootable.	If -r is not specified, the existing label will be
     updated via the in-core copy and any bootstrap code will be unaffected.
     If the disk does not already have a label, the -r flag must be used.  In
     either case, the kernel's in-core label is replaced.

     An existing disk label may be edited by using the -e flag.	 The label is
     read from the in-core kernel copy, or directly from the disk if the -r
     flag is also given.  The label is formatted and then supplied to an edi‐
     tor for changes.  If no editor is specified in an EDITOR environment
     variable, vi(1) is used.  When the editor terminates, the formatted label
     is reread and used to rewrite the disk label.  Existing bootstrap code is
     unchanged regardless of whether -r was specified.

     With the -R flag, disklabel is capable of restoring a disk label that was
     formatted in a prior operation and saved in an ascii file.	 The prototype
     file used to create the label should be in the same format as that pro‐
     duced when reading or editing a label.  Comments are delimited by # and
     newline.  As with -w, any existing bootstrap code will be clobbered if -r
     is specified and will be unaffected otherwise.

     The -NW flags for disklabel explicitly disallow and allow, respectively,
     writing of the pack label area on the selected disk.

     The final three forms of disklabel are used to install boostrap code on
     machines where the bootstrap is part of the label.	 The bootstrap code is
     comprised of one or two boot programs depending on the machine.  The -B
     option is used to denote that bootstrap code is to be installed.  The -r
     flag is implied by -B and never needs to be specified.  The name of the
     boot program(s) to be installed can be selected in a variety of ways.
     First, the names can be specified explicitly via the -b and -s flags.  On
     machines with only a single level of boot program, -b is the name of that
     program.  For machines with a two-level bootstrap, -b indicates the pri‐
     mary boot program and -s the secondary boot program.  If the names are
     not explicitly given, standard boot programs will be used.	 The boot pro‐
     grams are located in /usr/mdec.  The names of the programs are taken from
     the ``b0'' and ``b1'' parameters of the disktab(5) entry for the disk if
     disktype was given and its disktab entry exists and includes those param‐
     eters.  Otherwise, boot program names are derived from the name of the
     disk.  These names are of the form basenameboot for the primary (or only)
     bootstrap, and bootbasename for the secondary bootstrap; for example,
     /usr/mdec/sdboot and /usr/mdec/bootsd if the disk device is sd0.

     The first of the three boot-installation forms is used to install boot‐
     strap code without changing the existing label.  It is essentially a read
     command with respect to the disk label itself and all options are related
     to the specification of the boot program as described previously.	The
     final two forms are analogous to the basic write and restore versions
     except that they will install bootstrap code in addition to a new label.

FILES
     /etc/disktab
     /usr/mdec/xxboot
     /usr/mdec/bootxx

EXAMPLES
	   disklabel sd0

     Display the in-core label for sd0 as obtained via /dev/rsd0c.

	   disklabel -w -r /dev/rsd0c sd2212 foo

     Create a label for sd0 based on information for ``sd2212'' found in
     /etc/disktab.  Any existing bootstrap code will be clobbered.

	   disklabel -e -r sd0

     Read the on-disk label for sd0, edit it and reinstall in-core as well as
     on-disk.  Existing bootstrap code is unaffected.

	   disklabel -R sd0 mylabel

     Restore the on-disk and in-core label for sd0 from information in
     mylabel.  Existing bootstrap code is unaffected.

	   disklabel -B sd0

     Install a new bootstrap on sd0.  The boot code comes from
     /usr/mdec/sdboot and possibly /usr/mdec/bootsd.  On-disk and in-core
     labels are unchanged.

	   disklabel -w -B /dev/rsd0c -b newboot sd2212

     Install a new label and bootstrap.	 The label is derived from disktab
     information for ``sd2212'' and installed both in-core and on-disk.	 The
     bootstrap code comes from the file /usr/mdec/newboot.

SEE ALSO
     disktab(5), disklabel(5)

DIAGNOSTICS
     The kernel device drivers will not allow the size of a disk partition to
     be decreased or the offset of a partition to be changed while it is open.
     Some device drivers create a label containing only a single large parti‐
     tion if a disk is unlabeled; thus, the label must be written to the ``a''
     partition of the disk while it is open.  This sometimes requires the
     desired label to be set in two steps, the first one creating at least one
     other partition, and the second setting the label on the new partition
     while shrinking the ``a'' partition.

     On some machines the bootstrap code may not fit entirely in the area
     allocated for it by some filesystems.  As a result, it may not be possi‐
     ble to have filesystems on some partitions of a ``bootable'' disk.	 When
     installing bootstrap code, disklabel checks for these cases.  If the
     installed boot code would overlap a partition of type FS_UNUSED it is
     marked as type FS_BOOT.  The newfs(8) utility will disallow creation of
     filesystems on FS_BOOT partitions.	 Conversely, if a partition has a type
     other than FS_UNUSED or FS_BOOT, disklabel will not install bootstrap
     code that overlaps it.

BUGS
     When a disk name is given without a full pathname, the constructed device
     name uses the ``a'' partition on the tahoe, the ``c'' partition on all
     others.

4.2 Berkeley Distribution	March 28, 2024	     4.2 Berkeley Distribution
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