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Basic Linux Devices

Posted October 11th, 2007 by gnulinux

The first partition on a IDE hard drive is called partition 1, and is called /dev/hda1 if the drive is the primary IDE master.

  • /dev/fd0

    Floppy disk

    /dev/hda1

    IDE Hard drive 1, partition 1

    /dev/hdb3

    IDE Hard drive 2, partition 3

    /dev/sda1

    First SCSI interface (probably hard drive), device id 1

    /dev/sdc3

    First SCSI interface, device id 3

    /dev/cdrom

    CD ROM drive

    /dev/mouse

    Mouse device, sometimes a pointer to another device such as /dev/psaux, a ps/2 mouse driver.

     

    primary IDE master

    /dev/hda

    primary IDE slave

    /dev/hdb

    secondary IDE master

    /dev/hdc

    secondary IDE slave

    /dev/hdd

    • The first partition on a IDE hard drive is called partition 1, and is called /dev/hda1 if the drive is the primary IDE master.

    Accessing Removable Media

    Making a Linux Filesystem on a Floppy

    1. Use fdformat /dev/fd0H1440
    2. To make a filesystem on the disk type
    "mkfs –t filesystem –c /dev/fd0H1440"
    where filesystem is the type of filesystem, usually ext2 (linux native).
    3. Mount the filesystem "mount –t ext2 /dev/fd0 /mnt/floppy

    Mounting floppy and CD-ROM drives

    mount /dev/fd0 /mnt/floppy

    To mount a floppy

    umount /dev/fd0

    To unmount a floppy

    mount /dev/cdrom /mnt/cdrom

    To mount a cdrom or

    mount -t iso9660 -r /dev/cdrom /mnt/cdrom

    Another way to mount a CD-ROM with type specified or mount -t auto /dev/cdrom /mnt/cdrom

    Note: the CDROM may be on the secondary controller as a master (/dev/hdc) or slave (/dev/hdd). In fact, your /dev/cdrom is probably actually a softlink to one of these two devices, if you have an IDE interface. If you use SCSI, you will probably use something like /dev/sda1 or 2, etc.

    Mounting a parallel port zip drive:

    mount -t vfat /dev/sda4 /mnt/zipdrive

    Note: in all these examples, the mount points must exist, be empty, and not already have a device mounted on them. Also you must unmount the device before removing it.
    Setting up Removable and External Filesystems to Automatically mount when used

    1. The program "autofs" must be setup to run as a daemon upon system startup. To do this with Redhat
    linux, use the program "linuxconf" and select "Control", "Control panel", "Control Service activity".
    Activate "autofs" using the menu selections.
    2. Edit the file "/etc/auto.master" to the following:
    /mnt /etc/auto.misc --timeout 20
    The above example sets the program to unmount the device after 20 seconds.
    3. Edit the file "/etc/auto.misc" adding lines like:

    cd -fstype=iso9660,ro :/dev/cdrom
    fl -fstype=auto :/dev/fd0

    This will cause the cd-rom to be mounted when you access the directory "/mnt/cd" and the floppy to be
    mounted when you access "/mnt/fl". The directories "/mnt/cd" and "mnt/fl" must not exist in order for this
    to work.

    4. To use automount, put a cd in the CD-ROM drive and type "ls /mnt/cd" or "cd /mnt/cd".

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