Re: [PATCH] do not require that device is a partition

[Robert Millan <rmh@aybabtu.com>]

On Fri, Oct 05, 2007 at 02:30:08PM +0200, Robert Millan wrote:
> On Fri, Oct 05, 2007 at 11:59:48AM +0200, Robert Millan wrote:
> > -  else if (! dev->disk || ! dev->disk->has_partitions || dev->disk->partition)
> > +  else
> 
> Actually, the idea behind this check seems to be that if the device is a
> disk, we only want to probe for filesystems if it has no partitions.
> 
> The problem with this is that filesystems in general don't garantee us that
> the first 512 bytes aren't filled with information that, to the MBR partition
> table parser, is seen as garbage and results in undefined partition layout.
> 
> I think disk->has_partitions as a whole is flawed for this reason.  Should we
> get rid of it?

Thinking again, from GRUB POV we can't really tell wether the partition table
or the filesystem is right in this situation, so I would suggest to just not
use this in this particular check, but leave has_partitions as is, since it has
its purpose.

Any comments?

-- 
Robert Millan

<GPLv2> I know my rights; I want my phone call!
<DRM> What use is a phone call, if you are unable to speak?
(as seen on /.)