Has anyone implemented a "virtual cdrom" facility as offered on windows? That is CD images are cached & compressed on hard disk and shared across a network. See: http://www.winmag.com/library/1996/1196/11r24a.htm I have not found any news of a Unix solution. I would like to offer one on a Linux server to Windows clients. It should not be hard to implement with Samba... Thanks in advance. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Ralph Billes, | Phone: +61 (0) 8 9389 1680 Echo Labs. | Mobile: +61 (0) 41985 9603 Unix Systems Programming, | WWW: http://www.iinet.net.au/~echo/ Linux Installation & Support, | Email: echo@opera.iinet.net.au Internet Solutions and | Mail : 29 Weld St, Nedlands, WA 6009 Computer Communications. | Perth, Australia. ------------------------------------------------------------------------
> Has anyone implemented a "virtual cdrom" facility as offered > on > windows? That is CD images are cached & compressed on hard > disk and shared across a network. See: > > http://www.winmag.com/library/1996/1196/11r24a.htm > > I have not found any news of a Unix solution. I would > like to offer one on a Linux server to Windows clients. > > It should not be hard to implement with Samba...I have not tried this but it should work: You can copy the wohle filesystem of a cd-rom to the linux disk. (some thing like cat /dev/cdrom > /../../image) If it is compiled into the kernel (don't ask for the name of the option), you can mount this big file like a normal hard disk (mount /.../../image /shares/cdrom1) an then be exported like any other share. O.K. I admind, it is not compressed, ... Christian _____________________________________________________________ Dipl.-Wirtsch.-Ing. Christian Barth Universitaet Kaiserslautern Lehrstuhl fuer Fertigungstechnik und Betriebsorganisation Abteilung Fertigungstechnologie Raum 42/472 Postfach 3049 67655 Kaiserslautern Telefon 0631/205-2872 Telefax 0631/205-3238 email barth@cck.uni-kl.de
> Has anyone implemented a "virtual cdrom" facility as offered > on > windows? That is CD images are cached & compressed on hard > disk and shared across a network. See: > > http://www.winmag.com/library/1996/1196/11r24a.htm > > I have not found any news of a Unix solution. I would > like to offer one on a Linux server to Windows clients. > > It should not be hard to implement with Samba... > > Thanks in advance.Hi I assume you are using Linux: .) To create an cd-image: dd if=/dev/scd0 of=/where/ever/cd.img (/dev/scd0 for 1st scsi-cdrom) .) To mount that "virtual" cd mount /where/ever/cd.img /my/virtual/cd -t iso9660 -o loop Then just share /my/virtual/cd via samba, mars_new, netatalk.... If your apps complains that it can't find the cd use one of the pc/windows bases "cd-emulators" that "convert" any directory to a cdrom. Greetings, Florian Pflug
Subject: Virtual CDROM for Unix?
Message-ID: <3662536D.990E6384@iinet.net.au>
Has anyone implemented a "virtual cdrom" facility as
offered
on
windows? That is CD images are cached & compressed on hard
disk and shared across a network. See:
http://www.winmag.com/library/1996/1196/11r24a.htm
I have not found any news of a Unix solution. I would
like to offer one on a Linux server to Windows clients.
It should not be hard to implement with Samba...
Thanks in advance.
Linux supports a thing called the 'loop device' which reads a filesystem
from a
file.
You should be able to cat the contents of your cdrom to a file with:
cat /dev/cdrom > cdromfile
and then use losetup (there should be man page for it on your linux system) to
map the file to a device file, and then mount that as a unix path. This
won't
work for compressed images though, but should be faster than using your cdrom
changer. And of course, you'll need loop device support in the linux
kernel.
Or you could just copy the contents of the cdrom to a directory on the
harddrive.
Concerning autorun ability, I have not seen this work reliably or in some cases
at all with network mounted cdroms.
I've found it better to just buy a bunch of cdroms and scsi cards, rather
than
use a juke box setup. Harddrive space is much too important to waste on static
data that already exists on cdroms. I've found that using harddrive space
to
mirror cdroms is not really cost effective.
Andy Bakun
Dear List,> From: "Florian G. Pflug" <fgp@fgp.priv.at> > To: echo@iinet.net.au, Multiple recipients of list <samba@samba.org> > > > Has anyone implemented a "virtual cdrom" facility as offered > > on > > windows? That is CD images are cached & compressed on hard > > disk and shared across a network.> > It should not be hard to implement with Samba... > > I assume you are using Linux: > > ) To create an cd-image: > dd if=/dev/scd0 of=/where/ever/cd.img (/dev/scd0 for 1st scsi-cdrom) > > ) To mount that "virtual" cd > mount /where/ever/cd.img /my/virtual/cd -t iso9660 -o loopThat sound cool! I just copy the whole CD to a compressed ext2 partition on a Linux box shared by samba. For the compressed ext2 filesys under Linux see: http://debs.fuller.edu/e2compr/ Good Byte! This is the first day of the rest of Your life!