MOUNT A FLOPPY AIX 4.3

Article 1

TITLE    : Howto create a JFS filesystem on a floppy diskette.
OS LEVEL : AIX 4.3.3 and AIX 5.1.0
DATE     : 09/11/2001
VERSION  : 1.0

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The undocumented option nointegrity of /usr/sbin/mount allows us to
use floppy disks (and maybe other removable media) as read/write jfs
filesystems under AIX 4.3.3:

1) Insert formatted floppy into drive
2) mkfs -V jfs /dev/fd0
   Device /dev/fd0:
     Standard empty filesystem
     Size:           2880 512-byte (UBSIZE) blocks
     Initial Inodes: 512
3) mount -o nointegrity /dev/fd0 /mnt

You can even automount it with an appropriate entry in
/etc/auto_direct:

/floppy -fstype=jfs,rmv,nointegrity     :/dev/fd0

Article 2

Q how do I mount the floppy drive in AIX 4.3.3?
A1 You don't. Use the dosread/doswrite commands to treat it as a DOS 
floppy, or tar/cpio/etc. 
A2 If you really want a filesystem then: 


TITLE : Howto make a read only filesystem on a floppy diskette. 
OS LEVEL : AIX 
DATE : 17/01/99 
VERSION : 1.0 


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You can build a filesystem on a floppy and mount it, however the 
filesystem will be read only. The reason that the filesystem will be 
read only is because AIX cannot create a journal log on a diskette. 
The intended use is for temporary access to read only data. The 
diskette file system must be unmounted after use and during system 
backup procedures or errors could occur. 


To make the read only filesystem on a floppy: 


1. Make a subdirectory on an existing filesystem and place all of the 
   files that the diskette will contain into this subdirectory. 


2. Enter the following command to create a prototype file containing 
   information about the new filesystem, in the example /dir_struct 
   is the pathname of the subdirectory created in step 1, and 
   proto_filename is the name of the prototype file to be created. 


         proto /dir_struct > proto_filename 


3. Place a formatted floppy into the drive. 


4. Edit the prototype file and replace the first line with the following: 


         <noboot> 0 0 


5. Enter the following command to make the filesystem on your floppy: 


         mkfs -p proto_filename -V jfs /dev/fd0 


6. Create the directory upon which you will mount the floppy based 
   filesystem, or you can use /mnt. Mount the filesystem: 


         mount -r -V jfs /dev/fd0 /your_mount_point 


7. To unmount the filesystem: 


          umount /dev/fd0 


Article 3

Q Insert a floppy disk into the floppy disk drive. 
Execute the following command in order to mount the floppy disk to a fs: 
#mkfs -V jfs /dev/fd0 
mkfs: destroy /dev/fd0 (yes)? y 
Device /dev/fd0: 
Standard empty filesystem 
Size: 2880 512-byte (UBSIZE) blocks 
Initial Inodes: 512 
#mkdir /flo 
#mount -o nointegrity /dev/fd0 /flo 
mount: 0506-324 Cannot mount /dev/fd0 on /flo: There is an input or output 
error. 
Then i attempt to read file in the floppy disk: 
#dosread -D /dev/fd0 readme.txt chap.txt 
read: /dev/fd0: There is an input or output error. 
Abort, Retry, Ignore? 


Why the "mount" and "dosread" all fail ? (In Windows 2000 Server, the files 
in the floppy disk could be successfully read out). 

A1 Looks to me like you destroyed the layout of the floppy disk when you were 
asked to destroy it. You shouldn't be mounting a floppy disk anyway. Use the 
dosread, dosdir, and doswrite commands to perform operations on the floppy 
drive. 

A2 You can also use the mtools that comes with AIX 5. With mtools, you 
have commands available that emulate old dos commands: 


mdir 
mformat 
mcopy 
mmove 
mmd 
mattrib 


All you do is reference the floppy drive like a dos drive letter, ie 
"mcopy file.txt a:" or "mdir a:".