Syslinux - Jan 2008 - [Fwd: Re: extlinux reports "./extlinux: path /media/disk doesn't match device /dev/sda4"]

The problem as I view it, lies in specifying a
directory rather than a drive ( /mnt/.. or /media..
instead of /dev/sdb.. or /dev/sdc.. ). 

If, for instance, /dev/sdb1 is in fact mounted to
/media/disk all is fine. If the path exists and is not
a mountpoint ( /dev/sd... not 
mounted to it ), then extlinux will set the system
disk as base for the directory. ( i.e. /media/disk /dev/sda4 in my setup ), at
this
point no user acknowledgment is required, but BR
modified and extlinux.sys written to /media/disk.

TODO: run a few tests with hpa's extlinux to verify.

DONE: ./extlinux -i /media will in fact write to
/dev/sda4 if /dev/sdb1 is not mounted here.

Attached find a patch to /extlinux/extlinux.c which
gets along without expecting a special directory for
mounting the device to be made bootable.

The idea is, that the root directory "/" will always
be on the system disk, so I just added a pass to find
the "devname" belonging to "/" then 
proceeding as normal. If the devnames for "/" and the
target directory match, extlinux aborts indicating
this fact.

The programming isn't very beautiful and might need
some honing, but basically it works. So if, for what
reason ever, a device is not mounted at 
the path given extlinux will now exit rather than
writing over the system disks boot sector.

Casual







     
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Casual Programmer wrote:
> 
> The idea is, that the root directory "/" will always
> be on the system disk, so I just added a pass to find
> the "devname" belonging to "/" then 
> proceeding as normal. If the devnames for "/" and the
> target directory match, extlinux aborts indicating
> this fact.
> 
This is completely and totally bogus.

If extlinux is the system bootloader, then often what you call the 
system partition will be the one that should have extlinux installed on it.

	-hpa