On Sunday, July 18, 2010 23:35:34 Parshwa Murdia wrote: > > the result of "fdisk -l /dev/sda" is as follows: > > > > Disk /dev/sda: 250.0 GB, 250059350016 bytes > > 255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 30401 cylinders > > Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes > > Disk identifier: 0xfedcfedc > > > > Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System > > > > /dev/sda1 1 5737 46082421 7 HPFS/NTFS > > /dev/sda2 5738 30400 198105547+ f W95 Ext'd (LBA) > > /dev/sda5 5738 9561 30716248+ 7 HPFS/NTFS > > /dev/sda6 9562 13385 30716248+ 7 HPFS/NTFS > > /dev/sda7 13386 15935 20482843+ 7 HPFS/NTFS > > /dev/sda8 * 15936 15961 204799+ 83 Linux > > /dev/sda9 15961 28596 101487615+ 8e Linux LVM > > > > I don't know why there is no entry for sda3 and sda4. I guess the linux > > root partition to be sda8? or it should be sda9? Ok, as an aftermath, for educational purposes :-) : * The partition /dev/sda1 is what corresponds to the C: partition on Windows. It is the so-called "primary" partition, and only 4 of those can exist on the disk. They are named /dev/sda1 through /dev/sda4 in Linux. * You don't have any more primary partitions, and /dev/sda2 is instead a so- called "extended" partition, which is actually only a "container label" for all other partitions that follow, which are not primary. * The first partition contained inside the extended one is /dev/sda5 (if the number were less than 5 it would correspond to a primary partition, and could not be inside the extended one). This one is probably the Windows D: partition. * As above, /dev/sda6 and /dev/sda7 are also members of the extended partition, and correspond to your Windows drives E: and F:. Now, somewhere in between those letters Windows might stick the CD/DVD drives and assign its letters differently. The CD/DVD drives are *not* listed by the above fdisk command, and I can only guess how Windows will order its drive letters. * The /dev/sda8 partition is also a member of the extended one, and most probably the Fedora /boot partition, where the kernel and grub files reside. Windows does not show a letter for that one, since it doesn't recognize Linux partitions in general. * Finally, the /dev/sda9 partition is again not a real partition, but again a container like /dev/sda2 (although of quite different type). It is contained inside /dev/sda2, and it contains yet more partitions. This container is of LVM type, and contains all other Linux partitions (probably root and swap) inside. These partitions are not listed by fstab. I know it sounds complicated. And believe me, it is. That is what you get when you mix very old standards (only four partitions allowed on the disk) with patched technologies and new hyped ideas --- you get one primary partition, and several of them inside LVM which is inside the extended partition which is a bogus primary one. Don't ask me how did disk partitioning evolve into such a stupid state. When IDE disks were being standardized (long time ago), nobody dreamed that one day you might wish to have more than 4 partitions on the disk, dual boot system and wish to be able to resize partitions on a live disk. So they invented a stupid and shortsighted standard which had to be patched after it became *obviously* shortsighted... > > mounting this (for both sda8 and sda9), it shows me the error: > > * > > mount: unknown filesystem type 'lvm2pv'* (in the terminal) > > > > and once: > > * > > mount: you must specify the filesystem type* (in the terminal) > > > > so again it is not getting either mounted. Of course, as you already found out yourself, mounting partitions inside the LVM container is not the same as trying to mount the LVM container itself (the latter is bound to fail, since it is just a container, not an actual partition...). Hence the errors. Although I am confused about sda8, it is type 83 (ext2/3/4), that one *should* have worked. But nevermind now... ;-) And of course, I missed to remember that you probably have a LVM container by default, so my original instructions didn't work as I thought they should. My bad. But you found out what is the proper procedure for that case via google. :-) > [root@localhost oldfedora]# cat /etc/fstab [snip] > I don't understand why it is wrong? Well, the fstab file is a file that contains rows and columns. Specifically, each row must contain 6 columns. Column entries are separated with a space. So for example, the line tmpfs /tmp tmpfs defaults 0 0 has "tmpfs" in the first column, "/tmp" in the second, "tmpfs" in the third, "defaults" in the fourth, and "0" in fifth and sixth. And that is ok. Now, if you look at one of the lines you modified initially, for example: /dev/mapper/VolGroup-lv_root / ext4 defaults, noatime, nodiratime 1 1 I am counting 7 spaces total, which means that line has 8 columns, which the computer does not tolerate. The "defaults,", "noatime," and "nodiratime" are distributed into three columns, when they should all be in only one (4-th column). When you introduced extra spaces, you introduced extra columns, which is wrong. The right line should be /dev/mapper/VolGroup-lv_root / ext4 defaults,noatime,nodiratime 1 1 Now there are no extra columns, you have 5 spaces delimiting 6 columns total, and the data in the 4-th column is "defaults,noatime,nodiratime", as it should be. The computer knows how to interpret and understand this. If you want to read more about the structure and syntax of the fstab file, type "man fstab" in the terminal, and read on. The "man" command stands for "manual", and gives you usage instructions for whatever command you wish to know about. Try "man mount", "man ls", "man cd", "man vgscan", and so on. Try even "man man", there is a manual about using the manual. :-) If you want to be able to use Linux with greater power, you need to be skillful in using the terminal. Reading manual pages is the first place to start learning. If you are very determined to learn, read "man bash". If you are a masochist, read "man bash" twice. ;-) > But after much pondering over, I just deleted the gap between the > nodiratime,noatime and defaults, and really speaking after that only i was > able to boot from the original fedora. Precisely. After the explanation above, it should be clear what was wrong and why it is now correct. Best, :-) Marko -- users mailing list users@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx To unsubscribe or change subscription options: https://admin.fedoraproject.org/mailman/listinfo/users Guidelines: http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Mailing_list_guidelines
