Mounting .hdf files from Linux side? How?

[Hercules]

Hi all

I am wondering how to mount .hdf files under Linux. I know e-uae will mount them, but can I'd like to know how to mount from the Linux side rather than under e-uae emulation...

Any help on this would be greatfully received !

Thanks!

[mark_k]

Assuming you're using a normal HDF, which corresponds to a single partition (not an HDF with RDB, i.e. an image file of a complete hard disk), and you formatted the partition using FFS, try something like this:

# Create a directory where we'll mount the FFS partition
mkdir /media/test
mount -o ro,loop,bs=xxxx,reserved=xxx,verbose -t affs my_hdf_file.hdf /media/test

bs= specifies the block size. Could be 512, 1024, 2048, ... depending on how you formatted the partition. Linux only supports block sizes up to 4096 bytes. reserved= will usually be 2 which is the default. If so you don't need to specify it.

You might also need to add a root=xxxx argument to specify the location of the root block since it seems the Linux affs code sometimes can't find it.

If it works, you should have read-only access to the files in the HDF. I don't really trust the Linux affs code not to screw up when writing. Plus things like file comments and protection bits would be lost if you move files around using Linux.

When I tried this I think I remember that for some partitions, some files were missing from some directories when listed in Linux. If you notice anything similar please let me know.

If you want to mount partitions which are inside an RDB-type HDF that's also possible but you need to specify the correct offset= and sizelimit= arguments.

[OddbOd]

Originally Posted by mark_k

If you want to mount partitions which are inside an RDB-type HDF that's also possible but you need to specify the correct offset= and sizelimit= arguments.

There are some handy hints on doing this at: http://gareth.halfacree.co.uk/2013/0...es-under-linux despite this post talking about a physical drive a loop mounted hardfile works just as well.

@mark_k: Why is sizelimit needed?

[mark_k]

Originally Posted by OddbOd

@mark_k: Why is sizelimit needed?

If you have an RDB-type hardfile with several partitions:
[RDB area][partition 1][partition 2][unused space]

Let's say you want to mount partition 1. You'd use the offset option to specify where partition 1 begins in the hardfile. Without using sizelimit, the loopback device would cover from the start of partition 1 right to the end of the file. The root block of an FFS partition is (more or less) in the middle of the partition. Without specifying sizelimit, the Linux affs code will look for the root block half-way between the start of partition 1 and the end of the hardfile. Which might be at some random place in partition 2. By specifying sizelimit to be the size of partition 1, affs should hopefully be able to find the root block itself.

[MrDBUG]

No go with pds3 ?

[mark_k]

There is no PFS3 driver for Linux, so no. For data interchange either FFS or FAT(32) are simplest I think.