I want to write protect a partiton with essential personal and
archival data but access it from various OS

--
Vasos Panagiotopoulos panix.com/~vjp2/vasos.htm
---{Nothing herein constitutes advice. Everything fully disclaimed.}---

vjp2.at@at.biostrategist.dot.dot.com wrote:
> I want to write protect a partiton with essential personal and
> archival data but access it from various OS

Mount the filesystem (presumably you have a filesystem in the
partition) read-only.

Export it as a network filesystem to those 'other' OS'es (but also
export as read-only.

On Mon, 03 Apr 2023 20:09:42 -0400, <vjp2.at@at.biostrategist.dot.dot.com> wrote:
> I want to write protect a partiton with essential personal and
> archival data but access it from various OS

Unless the partition is stored on a device that supports write protecting the
entire device, such as a drive that supports the -r option of hdparm, there is
no way to do so.

While setting up rules within an os to ensure it's mounted read-only, can be done,
there is nothing at the file system level that will prevent the entire device from
being re-partitioned or erased, or mounted read-write on another install or system

It has to be done at the device level if it's going to be safe on various os.

Make a backup an keep that in a fire proof safe.

Regards, Dave Hodgins

On Tue, 4 Apr 2023 00:34:49 -0000 (UTC), Rich wrote:
>
> vjp2.at@at.biostrategist.dot.dot.com wrote:
>> I want to write protect a partiton with essential personal and
>> archival data but access it from various OS
>
> Mount the filesystem (presumably you have a filesystem in the
> partition) read-only.

The good ole mount command has the option -ro (read only).

To have this permanent, the mount process can be implemented in the
/etc/fstab.

An example from
<https://askubuntu.com/questions/839355/howto-mount-drive-as-read-only-with-fstab>.

/dev/disk/by-uuid/68271755-703c-48e6-a935-c1237de6b1a8 /mnt/HDD01 auto ro,nosuid,nodev,nofail,x-gvfs-show 0 0

That mounts the device node 68271755-703c-48e6-a935-c1237de6b1a8 at
/mnt/HDD01 read only (plus some other things you might want to omit).
--
Andreas

On 4/3/23 8:34 PM, Rich wrote:
> vjp2.at@at.biostrategist.dot.dot.com wrote:
>> I want to write protect a partiton with essential personal and
>> archival data but access it from various OS
>
> Mount the filesystem (presumably you have a filesystem in the
> partition) read-only.
>
> Export it as a network filesystem to those 'other' OS'es (but also
> export as read-only.

It is easy to make an SMB share read-only by tweaking
smb.conf

For mounting smb shares in some other box, a cifs mount
that employs "-o ro" works well.

For internal, intramachine, mounts there's always
"mount -bind" ... but it's a two-step where you
first mount, and then immediately remount as ro.

Intramachine you can also use Samba and mount to
localhost ... but it does slow things down a bit
due to the overhead.

I've been using these fixes the past weeks with an
aim of protecting source files from "rsync --delete"
screw-ups. I don't know if they are "perfect", safe
from every and all, but they are certainly "better".

I'd suggest starting with :

https://www.baeldung.com/linux/bind-mounts

"David W. Hodgins" <dwhodgins@nomail.afraid.org> writes:

> On Mon, 03 Apr 2023 20:09:42 -0400, <vjp2.at@at.biostrategist.dot.dot.com> wrote:
>> I want to write protect a partiton with essential personal and
>> archival data but access it from various OS
>
> Unless the partition is stored on a device that supports write protecting the
> entire device, such as a drive that supports the -r option of hdparm, there is
> no way to do so.
>
> While setting up rules within an os to ensure it's mounted read-only, can be done,
> there is nothing at the file system level that will prevent the entire device from
> being re-partitioned or erased, or mounted read-write on another install or system
>
> It has to be done at the device level if it's going to be safe on various os.
>
> Make a backup an keep that in a fire proof safe.
>
> Regards, Dave Hodgins

I suppose you could put it on an iso9660 file system.

There isn't enough information, does "from various OS" mean dual
booting, or across a network?

On 04/04/2023 at 03.46, Andreas Kohlbach wrote:
>>> I want to write protect a partiton with essential personal and
>>> archival data but access it from various OS
>>
>> Mount the filesystem (presumably you have a filesystem in the
>> partition) read-only.
>
> The good ole mount command has the option -ro (read only).
>
> To have this permanent, the mount process can be implemented in the
> /etc/fstab.

If it's an ext4 filesystem, it has 'read-only' feature that can be set,
so it always mounts read-only, even if you try to mount it (or remount,
or bind-mount) with -rw option explicitly specified. There is also
an 'immutable' file attribute if you just want to protect some files
and not necessarily the whole filesystem.

--
mrg

On 04/04/2023 01:09, vjp2.at@at.BioStrategist.dot.dot.com wrote:
> I want to write protect a partiton with essential personal and
> archival data but access it from various OS
>

Probably best to network it then and export it as read only.

I know it can be done with SMB, not sure about NFS.

Or could could simply issue a chown -R root * on its files followed by a
'chmod -R 755 etc etc..

--
“The fundamental cause of the trouble in the modern world today is that
the stupid are cocksure while the intelligent are full of doubt."

- Bertrand Russell

The Natural Philosopher <tnp@invalid.invalid> wrote:
> On 04/04/2023 01:09, vjp2.at@at.BioStrategist.dot.dot.com wrote:
>> I want to write protect a partiton with essential personal and
>> archival data but access it from various OS
>>
>
> Probably best to network it then and export it as read only.
>
> I know it can be done with SMB, not sure about NFS.

Actually it's the default in NFS. From exports(5):

"rw Allow both read and write requests on this NFS volume. The
default is to disallow any request which changes the filesystem.
This can also be made explicit by using the ro option.
"

Then again I would have guessed that a dual-boot arrangement on the
same computer is what the OP has in mind, so networked file systems
won't help with that. The post was so vague that my assumption will
probably be wrong though, and hence I decided not to bother trying
to answer directly in the first place (as with all the other posts
from the same user with their bizarrely-obscured email address).

> Or could could simply issue a chown -R root * on its files followed by a
> 'chmod -R 755 etc etc..

Useless if the "various OS" isn't always Linux or similar. But you
could set the read-only attribute on all files on a FAT or ExFAT
file system (I'm not sure what command does this in Linux though).
A FAT32 file system should be readable by pretty much any PC OS
that they're likely to try. It's possible that some OSs ignore the
read-only attribute though, I don't know.

At a lower level, it's possible to set SD cards to be permanently
(and irreversably) Read-only (even overriding the slidable r/w
indicator on the full-size ones), so one of those might be an
option depending on how much data is involved. Some custom hardware
might be required to set them read-only, I'm not sure whether many
normal SD card interfaces support doing so.

--
__ __
#_ < |\| |< _#

On 2023-04-05 00:59, Computer Nerd Kev wrote:
> The Natural Philosopher <tnp@invalid.invalid> wrote:
>> On 04/04/2023 01:09, vjp2.at@at.BioStrategist.dot.dot.com wrote:
>>> I want to write protect a partiton with essential personal and
>>> archival data but access it from various OS
>>>
>>
>> Probably best to network it then and export it as read only.
>>
>> I know it can be done with SMB, not sure about NFS.
>
> Actually it's the default in NFS. From exports(5):
>
> "rw Allow both read and write requests on this NFS volume. The
> default is to disallow any request which changes the filesystem.
> This can also be made explicit by using the ro option.
> "
>
> Then again I would have guessed that a dual-boot arrangement on the
> same computer is what the OP has in mind, so networked file systems
> won't help with that. The post was so vague that my assumption will
> probably be wrong though, and hence I decided not to bother trying
> to answer directly in the first place (as with all the other posts
> from the same user with their bizarrely-obscured email address).
>
>> Or could could simply issue a chown -R root * on its files followed by a
>> 'chmod -R 755 etc etc..
>
> Useless if the "various OS" isn't always Linux or similar. But you
> could set the read-only attribute on all files on a FAT or ExFAT
> file system (I'm not sure what command does this in Linux though).
> A FAT32 file system should be readable by pretty much any PC OS
> that they're likely to try. It's possible that some OSs ignore the
> read-only attribute though, I don't know.

Any attribute can be ignored by some other software.

>
> At a lower level, it's possible to set SD cards to be permanently
> (and irreversably) Read-only (even overriding the slidable r/w
> indicator on the full-size ones), so one of those might be an
> option depending on how much data is involved. Some custom hardware
> might be required to set them read-only, I'm not sure whether many
> normal SD card interfaces support doing so.
>

--
Cheers, Carlos.

Yes, I've been unclear.

I set up a partition as fat32 to be read by CAE Linux as well as Win XP

BTW, none of my OS recognised exfat, so I reformetted

--
Vasos Panagiotopoulos panix.com/~vjp2/vasos.htm
---{Nothing herein constitutes advice. Everything fully disclaimed.}---

vjp2.at@at.biostrategist.dot.dot.com wrote:
> Yes, I've been unclear.
>
> I set up a partition as fat32 to be read by CAE Linux as well as Win XP
>
> BTW, none of my OS recognised exfat, so I reformetted

If you mean "dual boot" into either Linux or XP, then you cannot write
protect a fat32 filesystem.

Your only option here would be to write the fat32 filesystem onto a
read-only medium (CD-R, DVD-R, BD-R, etc.) or /maybe/ an SD card with
the "write protect" switch turned on, and plugged into a reader that
actually honors the "write protect" setting of the switch.

On my previous dual boot, XP couldn't see unix or dos files,
but Quantian (debian/knoppix) could see everything,
though it was write-protected.

Now Xp and CAELinux have perfect access to everything.

--
Vasos Panagiotopoulos panix.com/~vjp2/vasos.htm
---{Nothing herein constitutes advice. Everything fully disclaimed.}---

On 4/6/23 3:45 PM, Rich wrote:
> vjp2.at@at.biostrategist.dot.dot.com wrote:
>> Yes, I've been unclear.
>>
>> I set up a partition as fat32 to be read by CAE Linux as well as Win XP
>>
>> BTW, none of my OS recognised exfat, so I reformetted
>
> If you mean "dual boot" into either Linux or XP, then you cannot write
> protect a fat32 filesystem.
>
> Your only option here would be to write the fat32 filesystem onto a
> read-only medium (CD-R, DVD-R, BD-R, etc.) or /maybe/ an SD card with
> the "write protect" switch turned on, and plugged into a reader that
> actually honors the "write protect" setting of the switch.

For the record, I *am* beginning to wonder
about Mr. "vip" ... lots of really weird
questions, yet little cognizant reply to
the proposed solutions. A very sly, subtle,
sort of troll ??? The narrowness of this group
would suggest the futility, but then some ....

For the short term I will still consider the OP
as a "Winders Victim" looking for a better path ...
yet still ............

26B.X919 <26BX919@zoq21u.net> wrote:
> On 4/6/23 3:45 PM, Rich wrote:
>> vjp2.at@at.biostrategist.dot.dot.com wrote:
>>> Yes, I've been unclear.
>>>
>>> I set up a partition as fat32 to be read by CAE Linux as well as
>>> Win XP
>>>
>>> BTW, none of my OS recognised exfat, so I reformetted
>>
>> If you mean "dual boot" into either Linux or XP, then you cannot
>> write protect a fat32 filesystem.
>>
>> Your only option here would be to write the fat32 filesystem onto a
>> read-only medium (CD-R, DVD-R, BD-R, etc.) or /maybe/ an SD card
>> with the "write protect" switch turned on, and plugged into a reader
>> that actually honors the "write protect" setting of the switch.
>
> For the record, I *am* beginning to wonder about Mr. "vip" ...
> lots of really weird questions, yet little cognizant reply to the
> proposed solutions. A very sly, subtle, sort of troll ??? The
> narrowness of this group would suggest the futility, but then some
> ....
>
> For the short term I will still consider the OP as a "Winders
> Victim" looking for a better path ... yet still ............

Indeed, mr "vip" is tickling the feelers for "something smells fishy
here". Nothing concrete yet, but there is definetly a "something
weird" feeling from him.

On 4/7/23 12:26 PM, Rich wrote:
> 26B.X919 <26BX919@zoq21u.net> wrote:
>> On 4/6/23 3:45 PM, Rich wrote:
>>> vjp2.at@at.biostrategist.dot.dot.com wrote:
>>>> Yes, I've been unclear.
>>>>
>>>> I set up a partition as fat32 to be read by CAE Linux as well as
>>>> Win XP
>>>>
>>>> BTW, none of my OS recognised exfat, so I reformetted
>>>
>>> If you mean "dual boot" into either Linux or XP, then you cannot
>>> write protect a fat32 filesystem.
>>>
>>> Your only option here would be to write the fat32 filesystem onto a
>>> read-only medium (CD-R, DVD-R, BD-R, etc.) or /maybe/ an SD card
>>> with the "write protect" switch turned on, and plugged into a reader
>>> that actually honors the "write protect" setting of the switch.
>>
>> For the record, I *am* beginning to wonder about Mr. "vip" ...
>> lots of really weird questions, yet little cognizant reply to the
>> proposed solutions. A very sly, subtle, sort of troll ??? The
>> narrowness of this group would suggest the futility, but then some
>> ....
>>
>> For the short term I will still consider the OP as a "Winders
>> Victim" looking for a better path ... yet still ............
>
> Indeed, mr "vip" is tickling the feelers for "something smells fishy
> here". Nothing concrete yet, but there is definetly a "something
> weird" feeling from him.

Mr. vjp ... if his info is correct he has a seriously Greek
name, so we may just be looking at a language problem here.

He now claims that in a dual-boot setup with XP that XP can
see the Linux, likely ext4, partitions and their info. As I
recall XP was very unfriendly towards ext3/4 and would just
see such partitions as black holes unless you added some
extra software. It IS possible he installed Linux in a FAT32
or NTFS partition though. I've never tried that but supposedly
it would work.

In any case, if he's an actual troll, it's a very subtle
sort of trolling indeed - and I have to wonder "why HERE ?"
There only seem to be maybe 30 people who post to coslm
with any regularity.

26B.X919 <26BX919@zoq21u.net> wrote:
> On 4/7/23 12:26 PM, Rich wrote:
>> 26B.X919 <26BX919@zoq21u.net> wrote:
>>> On 4/6/23 3:45 PM, Rich wrote:
>>>> vjp2.at@at.biostrategist.dot.dot.com wrote:
>>>>> Yes, I've been unclear.
>>>>>
>>>>> I set up a partition as fat32 to be read by CAE Linux as well as
>>>>> Win XP
>>>>>
>>>>> BTW, none of my OS recognised exfat, so I reformetted
>>>>
>>>> If you mean "dual boot" into either Linux or XP, then you cannot
>>>> write protect a fat32 filesystem.
>>>>
>>>> Your only option here would be to write the fat32 filesystem onto
>>>> a read-only medium (CD-R, DVD-R, BD-R, etc.) or /maybe/ an SD card
>>>> with the "write protect" switch turned on, and plugged into a
>>>> reader that actually honors the "write protect" setting of the
>>>> switch.
>>>
>>> For the record, I *am* beginning to wonder about Mr. "vip" ...
>>> lots of really weird questions, yet little cognizant reply to
>>> the proposed solutions. A very sly, subtle, sort of troll ???
>>> The narrowness of this group would suggest the futility, but
>>> then some
>>> ....
>>>
>>> For the short term I will still consider the OP as a "Winders
>>> Victim" looking for a better path ... yet still ............
>>
>> Indeed, mr "vip" is tickling the feelers for "something smells fishy
>> here". Nothing concrete yet, but there is definetly a "something
>> weird" feeling from him.
>
> Mr. vjp ... if his info is correct he has a seriously Greek name,
> so we may just be looking at a language problem here.

Can't comment on his "Greekness". He does come across as either ESL or
a good troll. Seems, so far, more on the ESL side, but there's those
nagging "smells" too.

> He now claims that in a dual-boot setup with XP that XP can see the
> Linux, likely ext4, partitions and their info. As I recall XP was
> very unfriendly towards ext3/4 and would just see such partitions
> as black holes unless you added some extra software.

Microsoft OS'es have always been unfriendly to non-MS filesystems.
Usually offering up a dialog of the form of: "Disk E: is damaged, would
you like to reformat: Yes / No"

> It IS possible he installed Linux in a FAT32 or NTFS partition
> though. I've never tried that but supposedly it would work.

FAT32 would be a real accomplishment, what with a large number of
necessary Linux config files having standard names that violate the 8+3
filename limits of FAT32. VFAT /might/ work, in that it at least would
allow for long names. But neither has Unix permissions, so no
binariess would be set as executable, so I doubt anything would work
(at least not without also modifying the kernel to operate on a
filesystem without permissions flags).

And, if your estimate is correct (windows user tinkering with Linux)
then do you honestly think a "windows user tinkering with Linux" would
ever pull off installing Linux to any of FAT32, VFAT, or NTFS (at least
NTFS would come with permissions flags)?

If your estimate is correct I would suggest that it would be nigh on
impossible for a general "windows user tinkering with Linux" to pull
off installing Linux onto a native MS filesystem.

> In any case, if he's an actual troll, it's a very subtle sort of
> trolling indeed - and I have to wonder "why HERE ?" There only seem
> to be maybe 30 people who post to coslm with any regularity.

Agreed, if he is trolling, it is very subtle, "boil the frog" style
trolling.

As far as 'why here' -- no one but the trolls can answer that one.
There are numerous trolls across groups, many with no larger a regular
count than here, yet the trolls still troll. I suspect some of the
trolls would troll an empty group, just to be trolling.

Same as with the spammers. The "user count" on most Usenet groups is
so small, and very many of the same nick's appear across plural
disparate groups (meaning 4 groups of 10 users each isn't 40 users, but
more like 20 total spread across the 4) that spamming seems pointless.
Yes, it is all but free to do so, but with only 10-20 total people who
would even see the message, why bother. Yet the spammers still show.

For a sad example, peek into sci.crypt. There are bitcoin/crypto/love
spell spammers who have falllen in love with that group so much they
post 70 spams a day some days. And the 'regular' count there over the
last few years has not exceeded much more than about 10 or so.

On Fri, 07 Apr 2023 22:06:15 -0400, Rich <rich@example.invalid> wrote:
> 26B.X919 <26BX919@zoq21u.net> wrote:
>> On 4/7/23 12:26 PM, Rich wrote:
>>> 26B.X919 <26BX919@zoq21u.net> wrote:
>>>> On 4/6/23 3:45 PM, Rich wrote:
>>>>> vjp2.at@at.biostrategist.dot.dot.com wrote:
>>>>>> Yes, I've been unclear.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> I set up a partition as fat32 to be read by CAE Linux as well as
>>>>>> Win XP
>>>>>>
>>>>>> BTW, none of my OS recognised exfat, so I reformetted
>>>>>
>>>>> If you mean "dual boot" into either Linux or XP, then you cannot
>>>>> write protect a fat32 filesystem.
>>>>>
>>>>> Your only option here would be to write the fat32 filesystem onto
>>>>> a read-only medium (CD-R, DVD-R, BD-R, etc.) or /maybe/ an SD card
>>>>> with the "write protect" switch turned on, and plugged into a
>>>>> reader that actually honors the "write protect" setting of the
>>>>> switch.
>>>>
>>>> For the record, I *am* beginning to wonder about Mr. "vip" ...
>>>> lots of really weird questions, yet little cognizant reply to
>>>> the proposed solutions. A very sly, subtle, sort of troll ???
>>>> The narrowness of this group would suggest the futility, but
>>>> then some
>>>> ....
>>>>
>>>> For the short term I will still consider the OP as a "Winders
>>>> Victim" looking for a better path ... yet still ............
>>>
>>> Indeed, mr "vip" is tickling the feelers for "something smells fishy
>>> here". Nothing concrete yet, but there is definetly a "something
>>> weird" feeling from him.
>>
>> Mr. vjp ... if his info is correct he has a seriously Greek name,
>> so we may just be looking at a language problem here.
>
> Can't comment on his "Greekness". He does come across as either ESL or
> a good troll. Seems, so far, more on the ESL side, but there's those
> nagging "smells" too.
>
>> He now claims that in a dual-boot setup with XP that XP can see the
>> Linux, likely ext4, partitions and their info. As I recall XP was
>> very unfriendly towards ext3/4 and would just see such partitions
>> as black holes unless you added some extra software.
>
> Microsoft OS'es have always been unfriendly to non-MS filesystems.
> Usually offering up a dialog of the form of: "Disk E: is damaged, would
> you like to reformat: Yes / No"

https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/microsoft/windows-10-now-lets-you-mount-linux-ext4-filesystems-in-wsl-2/

Regards, Dave Hodgins

On Fri, 07 Apr 2023 23:43:33 -0400, David W. Hodgins <dwhodgins@nomail.afraid.org> wrote:

> On Fri, 07 Apr 2023 22:06:15 -0400, Rich <rich@example.invalid> wrote:
>> 26B.X919 <26BX919@zoq21u.net> wrote:
>>> On 4/7/23 12:26 PM, Rich wrote:
>>>> 26B.X919 <26BX919@zoq21u.net> wrote:
>>>>> On 4/6/23 3:45 PM, Rich wrote:
>>>>>> vjp2.at@at.biostrategist.dot.dot.com wrote:
>>>>>>> Yes, I've been unclear.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> I set up a partition as fat32 to be read by CAE Linux as well as
>>>>>>> Win XP
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> BTW, none of my OS recognised exfat, so I reformetted
>>>>>>
>>>>>> If you mean "dual boot" into either Linux or XP, then you cannot
>>>>>> write protect a fat32 filesystem.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Your only option here would be to write the fat32 filesystem onto
>>>>>> a read-only medium (CD-R, DVD-R, BD-R, etc.) or /maybe/ an SD card
>>>>>> with the "write protect" switch turned on, and plugged into a
>>>>>> reader that actually honors the "write protect" setting of the
>>>>>> switch.
>>>>>
>>>>> For the record, I *am* beginning to wonder about Mr. "vip" ...
>>>>> lots of really weird questions, yet little cognizant reply to
>>>>> the proposed solutions. A very sly, subtle, sort of troll ???
>>>>> The narrowness of this group would suggest the futility, but
>>>>> then some
>>>>> ....
>>>>>
>>>>> For the short term I will still consider the OP as a "Winders
>>>>> Victim" looking for a better path ... yet still ............
>>>>
>>>> Indeed, mr "vip" is tickling the feelers for "something smells fishy
>>>> here". Nothing concrete yet, but there is definetly a "something
>>>> weird" feeling from him.
>>>
>>> Mr. vjp ... if his info is correct he has a seriously Greek name,
>>> so we may just be looking at a language problem here.
>>
>> Can't comment on his "Greekness". He does come across as either ESL or
>> a good troll. Seems, so far, more on the ESL side, but there's those
>> nagging "smells" too.
>>
>>> He now claims that in a dual-boot setup with XP that XP can see the
>>> Linux, likely ext4, partitions and their info. As I recall XP was
>>> very unfriendly towards ext3/4 and would just see such partitions
>>> as black holes unless you added some extra software.
>>
>> Microsoft OS'es have always been unfriendly to non-MS filesystems.
>> Usually offering up a dialog of the form of: "Disk E: is damaged, would
>> you like to reformat: Yes / No"
>
> https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/microsoft/windows-10-now-lets-you-mount-linux-ext4-filesystems-in-wsl-2/

Oops. For XP see
https://superuser.com/questions/37512/how-to-read-ext4-partitions-on-windows

Regards, Dave Hodgins

David W. Hodgins <dwhodgins@nomail.afraid.org> wrote:
> On Fri, 07 Apr 2023 22:06:15 -0400, Rich <rich@example.invalid> wrote:
>> 26B.X919 <26BX919@zoq21u.net> wrote:
>>> On 4/7/23 12:26 PM, Rich wrote:
>>>> 26B.X919 <26BX919@zoq21u.net> wrote:
>>>>> On 4/6/23 3:45 PM, Rich wrote:
>>>>>> vjp2.at@at.biostrategist.dot.dot.com wrote:
>>>>>>> Yes, I've been unclear.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> I set up a partition as fat32 to be read by CAE Linux as well as
>>>>>>> Win XP
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> BTW, none of my OS recognised exfat, so I reformetted
>>>>>>
>>>>>> If you mean "dual boot" into either Linux or XP, then you cannot
>>>>>> write protect a fat32 filesystem.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Your only option here would be to write the fat32 filesystem onto
>>>>>> a read-only medium (CD-R, DVD-R, BD-R, etc.) or /maybe/ an SD card
>>>>>> with the "write protect" switch turned on, and plugged into a
>>>>>> reader that actually honors the "write protect" setting of the
>>>>>> switch.
>>>>>
>>>>> For the record, I *am* beginning to wonder about Mr. "vip" ...
>>>>> lots of really weird questions, yet little cognizant reply to
>>>>> the proposed solutions. A very sly, subtle, sort of troll ???
>>>>> The narrowness of this group would suggest the futility, but
>>>>> then some
>>>>> ....
>>>>>
>>>>> For the short term I will still consider the OP as a "Winders
>>>>> Victim" looking for a better path ... yet still ............
>>>>
>>>> Indeed, mr "vip" is tickling the feelers for "something smells fishy
>>>> here". Nothing concrete yet, but there is definetly a "something
>>>> weird" feeling from him.
>>>
>>> Mr. vjp ... if his info is correct he has a seriously Greek name,
>>> so we may just be looking at a language problem here.
>>
>> Can't comment on his "Greekness". He does come across as either ESL or
>> a good troll. Seems, so far, more on the ESL side, but there's those
>> nagging "smells" too.
>>
>>> He now claims that in a dual-boot setup with XP that XP can see the
>>> Linux, likely ext4, partitions and their info. As I recall XP was
>>> very unfriendly towards ext3/4 and would just see such partitions
>>> as black holes unless you added some extra software.
>>
>> Microsoft OS'es have always been unfriendly to non-MS filesystems.
>> Usually offering up a dialog of the form of: "Disk E: is damaged, would
>> you like to reformat: Yes / No"
>
> https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/microsoft/windows-10-now-lets-you-mount-linux-ext4-filesystems-in-wsl-2/

Ah, so their 'unfriendlyness' was lowered with W10. Worth knowing.

David W. Hodgins <dwhodgins@nomail.afraid.org> wrote:
> On Fri, 07 Apr 2023 23:43:33 -0400, David W. Hodgins <dwhodgins@nomail.afraid.org> wrote:
>
>> On Fri, 07 Apr 2023 22:06:15 -0400, Rich <rich@example.invalid> wrote:
>>> 26B.X919 <26BX919@zoq21u.net> wrote:
>>>> On 4/7/23 12:26 PM, Rich wrote:
>>>>> 26B.X919 <26BX919@zoq21u.net> wrote:
>>>>>> On 4/6/23 3:45 PM, Rich wrote:
>>>>>>> vjp2.at@at.biostrategist.dot.dot.com wrote:
>>>>>>>> Yes, I've been unclear.
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> I set up a partition as fat32 to be read by CAE Linux as well as
>>>>>>>> Win XP
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> BTW, none of my OS recognised exfat, so I reformetted
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> If you mean "dual boot" into either Linux or XP, then you cannot
>>>>>>> write protect a fat32 filesystem.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Your only option here would be to write the fat32 filesystem onto
>>>>>>> a read-only medium (CD-R, DVD-R, BD-R, etc.) or /maybe/ an SD card
>>>>>>> with the "write protect" switch turned on, and plugged into a
>>>>>>> reader that actually honors the "write protect" setting of the
>>>>>>> switch.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> For the record, I *am* beginning to wonder about Mr. "vip" ...
>>>>>> lots of really weird questions, yet little cognizant reply to
>>>>>> the proposed solutions. A very sly, subtle, sort of troll ???
>>>>>> The narrowness of this group would suggest the futility, but
>>>>>> then some
>>>>>> ....
>>>>>>
>>>>>> For the short term I will still consider the OP as a "Winders
>>>>>> Victim" looking for a better path ... yet still ............
>>>>>
>>>>> Indeed, mr "vip" is tickling the feelers for "something smells fishy
>>>>> here". Nothing concrete yet, but there is definetly a "something
>>>>> weird" feeling from him.
>>>>
>>>> Mr. vjp ... if his info is correct he has a seriously Greek name,
>>>> so we may just be looking at a language problem here.
>>>
>>> Can't comment on his "Greekness". He does come across as either ESL or
>>> a good troll. Seems, so far, more on the ESL side, but there's those
>>> nagging "smells" too.
>>>
>>>> He now claims that in a dual-boot setup with XP that XP can see the
>>>> Linux, likely ext4, partitions and their info. As I recall XP was
>>>> very unfriendly towards ext3/4 and would just see such partitions
>>>> as black holes unless you added some extra software.
>>>
>>> Microsoft OS'es have always been unfriendly to non-MS filesystems.
>>> Usually offering up a dialog of the form of: "Disk E: is damaged, would
>>> you like to reformat: Yes / No"
>>
>> https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/microsoft/windows-10-now-lets-you-mount-linux-ext4-filesystems-in-wsl-2/
>
> Oops. For XP see
> https://superuser.com/questions/37512/how-to-read-ext4-partitions-on-windows

Yes, possible, but those examples, for XP, are with using third party
tools. MS never themselves provided any ability in XP to read Linux
format filesystems.

Yet the OP has XP reading Linux filesystems, seemingly without a peep
about needing to install a third party tool into XP in order to do so.
It is possible they omitted this small factoid, making it seem as if
they had a magic XP variant that worked to read their Linux
filesystems.

Rich <rich@example.invalid> wrote:
> 26B.X919 <26BX919@zoq21u.net> wrote:
>
>> It IS possible he installed Linux in a FAT32 or NTFS partition
>> though. I've never tried that but supposedly it would work.
>
> FAT32 would be a real accomplishment, what with a large number of
> necessary Linux config files having standard names that violate the 8+3
> filename limits of FAT32. VFAT /might/ work, in that it at least would
> allow for long names. But neither has Unix permissions, so no
> binariess would be set as executable,

You can mount FAT filesystems so that all files appear with
executable permission. That's also default when I mount NTFS
filesystems with ntfs-3g, I didn't know there was a way to get
Linux to use NTFS permissions until reading up on it now.

> so I doubt anything would work
> (at least not without also modifying the kernel to operate on a
> filesystem without permissions flags).

Well one way to side-step the issue is to run from RAM and simply
unpack the file system from one archive file on the FAT filesystem.
It could just be a ZIP archive, in which case XP would open it like
a directory (although that functionality seemed to be quite buggy in
XP, and it might toss out the permission info stored by Info-ZIP).

> And, if your estimate is correct (windows user tinkering with Linux)
> then do you honestly think a "windows user tinkering with Linux" would
> ever pull off installing Linux to any of FAT32, VFAT, or NTFS (at least
> NTFS would come with permissions flags)?
>
> If your estimate is correct I would suggest that it would be nigh on
> impossible for a general "windows user tinkering with Linux" to pull
> off installing Linux onto a native MS filesystem.

That might depend on how accomodating the installation system tries
to be, but they certainly wouldn't accidentally set it up my way,
running from RAM.

--
__ __
#_ < |\| |< _#

Rich <rich@example.invalid> writes:

> David W. Hodgins <dwhodgins@nomail.afraid.org> wrote:
>> On Fri, 07 Apr 2023 22:06:15 -0400, Rich <rich@example.invalid> wrote:
>>> 26B.X919 <26BX919@zoq21u.net> wrote:
>>>> On 4/7/23 12:26 PM, Rich wrote:
>>>>> 26B.X919 <26BX919@zoq21u.net> wrote:
>>>>>> On 4/6/23 3:45 PM, Rich wrote:
>>>>>>> vjp2.at@at.biostrategist.dot.dot.com wrote:
>>>>>>>> Yes, I've been unclear.
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> I set up a partition as fat32 to be read by CAE Linux as well as
>>>>>>>> Win XP
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> BTW, none of my OS recognised exfat, so I reformetted
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> If you mean "dual boot" into either Linux or XP, then you cannot
>>>>>>> write protect a fat32 filesystem.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Your only option here would be to write the fat32 filesystem onto
>>>>>>> a read-only medium (CD-R, DVD-R, BD-R, etc.) or /maybe/ an SD card
>>>>>>> with the "write protect" switch turned on, and plugged into a
>>>>>>> reader that actually honors the "write protect" setting of the
>>>>>>> switch.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> For the record, I *am* beginning to wonder about Mr. "vip" ...
>>>>>> lots of really weird questions, yet little cognizant reply to
>>>>>> the proposed solutions. A very sly, subtle, sort of troll ???
>>>>>> The narrowness of this group would suggest the futility, but
>>>>>> then some
>>>>>> ....
>>>>>>
>>>>>> For the short term I will still consider the OP as a "Winders
>>>>>> Victim" looking for a better path ... yet still ............
>>>>>
>>>>> Indeed, mr "vip" is tickling the feelers for "something smells fishy
>>>>> here". Nothing concrete yet, but there is definetly a "something
>>>>> weird" feeling from him.
>>>>
>>>> Mr. vjp ... if his info is correct he has a seriously Greek name,
>>>> so we may just be looking at a language problem here.
>>>
>>> Can't comment on his "Greekness". He does come across as either ESL or
>>> a good troll. Seems, so far, more on the ESL side, but there's those
>>> nagging "smells" too.
>>>
>>>> He now claims that in a dual-boot setup with XP that XP can see the
>>>> Linux, likely ext4, partitions and their info. As I recall XP was
>>>> very unfriendly towards ext3/4 and would just see such partitions
>>>> as black holes unless you added some extra software.
>>>
>>> Microsoft OS'es have always been unfriendly to non-MS filesystems.
>>> Usually offering up a dialog of the form of: "Disk E: is damaged, would
>>> you like to reformat: Yes / No"
>>
>> https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/microsoft/windows-10-now-lets-you-mount-linux-ext4-filesystems-in-wsl-2/
>
> Ah, so their 'unfriendlyness' was lowered with W10. Worth knowing.

What if you ran linux in a virtual machine on windows, and then shared
files via Samba? I read it is possible to access physical drives with
virtual box.

Richmond <dnomhcir@gmx.com> wrote:
> Rich <rich@example.invalid> writes:
>
>> David W. Hodgins <dwhodgins@nomail.afraid.org> wrote:
>>> On Fri, 07 Apr 2023 22:06:15 -0400, Rich <rich@example.invalid> wrote:
>>>> 26B.X919 <26BX919@zoq21u.net> wrote:
>>>>> On 4/7/23 12:26 PM, Rich wrote:
>>>>>> 26B.X919 <26BX919@zoq21u.net> wrote:
>>>>>>> On 4/6/23 3:45 PM, Rich wrote:
>>>>>>>> vjp2.at@at.biostrategist.dot.dot.com wrote:
>>>>>>>>> Yes, I've been unclear.
>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>> I set up a partition as fat32 to be read by CAE Linux as well as
>>>>>>>>> Win XP
>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>> BTW, none of my OS recognised exfat, so I reformetted
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> If you mean "dual boot" into either Linux or XP, then you cannot
>>>>>>>> write protect a fat32 filesystem.
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> Your only option here would be to write the fat32 filesystem onto
>>>>>>>> a read-only medium (CD-R, DVD-R, BD-R, etc.) or /maybe/ an SD card
>>>>>>>> with the "write protect" switch turned on, and plugged into a
>>>>>>>> reader that actually honors the "write protect" setting of the
>>>>>>>> switch.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> For the record, I *am* beginning to wonder about Mr. "vip" ...
>>>>>>> lots of really weird questions, yet little cognizant reply to
>>>>>>> the proposed solutions. A very sly, subtle, sort of troll ???
>>>>>>> The narrowness of this group would suggest the futility, but
>>>>>>> then some
>>>>>>> ....
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> For the short term I will still consider the OP as a "Winders
>>>>>>> Victim" looking for a better path ... yet still ............
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Indeed, mr "vip" is tickling the feelers for "something smells fishy
>>>>>> here". Nothing concrete yet, but there is definetly a "something
>>>>>> weird" feeling from him.
>>>>>
>>>>> Mr. vjp ... if his info is correct he has a seriously Greek name,
>>>>> so we may just be looking at a language problem here.
>>>>
>>>> Can't comment on his "Greekness". He does come across as either ESL or
>>>> a good troll. Seems, so far, more on the ESL side, but there's those
>>>> nagging "smells" too.
>>>>
>>>>> He now claims that in a dual-boot setup with XP that XP can see the
>>>>> Linux, likely ext4, partitions and their info. As I recall XP was
>>>>> very unfriendly towards ext3/4 and would just see such partitions
>>>>> as black holes unless you added some extra software.
>>>>
>>>> Microsoft OS'es have always been unfriendly to non-MS filesystems.
>>>> Usually offering up a dialog of the form of: "Disk E: is damaged, would
>>>> you like to reformat: Yes / No"
>>>
>>> https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/microsoft/windows-10-now-lets-you-mount-linux-ext4-filesystems-in-wsl-2/
>>
>> Ah, so their 'unfriendlyness' was lowered with W10. Worth knowing.
>
> What if you ran linux in a virtual machine on windows, and then shared
> files via Samba? I read it is possible to access physical drives with
> virtual box.

You can do that, but then you have Virtual box moderating the disk
accesses (if you use VB's native method) or you have Samba moderating
the disk accesses (if you use Samba). But up until, it seems, W10
windows provided no 'out-of-the-box' access to any Linux filesystems.
You needed some 'moderator' in between (VB/Samba) or you needed to
install third party utilities/drivers.

And with the OP, all of everyone's suggestion to use Virtual Box to
accomplish what appeared to be his initial request from the vague post
fell on deaf ears, so there is no suggestion that the OP installed
Virtual Box in any way.

The OP also never asked about Samba -- so while he may have gone that
route and not told us about it, we also have no knowledge that this was
the way he went.

His post of 'success' heavily implied that he magically got Win XP to
access Linux filesystems without any additional help. But he left
enough detail off to create a huge possibility of miss-interpretation
as well.

Computer Nerd Kev <not@telling.you.invalid> wrote:
> Rich <rich@example.invalid> wrote:
>> 26B.X919 <26BX919@zoq21u.net> wrote:
>>
>>> It IS possible he installed Linux in a FAT32 or NTFS partition
>>> though. I've never tried that but supposedly it would work.
>>
>> FAT32 would be a real accomplishment, what with a large number of
>> necessary Linux config files having standard names that violate the 8+3
>> filename limits of FAT32. VFAT /might/ work, in that it at least would
>> allow for long names. But neither has Unix permissions, so no
>> binariess would be set as executable,
>
> You can mount FAT filesystems so that all files appear with
> executable permission.

Ah, I forgot about the 'force flags to say X' FAT32 mount option. That
would work around the issue, but also make /every/ file appear to be
executable too. But do we really think mr "vp", given his posts so
far, is even aware of this option and would have any idea of its
meaning?

> That's also default when I mount NTFS filesystems with ntfs-3g, I
> didn't know there was a way to get Linux to use NTFS permissions
> until reading up on it now.

At least NTFS has 'permissions' -- so it is much closer. I don't use
NTFS filesystems myself, so I'm unsure how closely matched to Linux FS
permissions they might be.

>> so I doubt anything would work (at least not without also modifying
>> the kernel to operate on a filesystem without permissions flags).
>
> Well one way to side-step the issue is to run from RAM and simply
> unpack the file system from one archive file on the FAT filesystem.
> It could just be a ZIP archive, in which case XP would open it like
> a directory (although that functionality seemed to be quite buggy in
> XP, and it might toss out the permission info stored by Info-ZIP).

True, a 'live disk image' living on the FAT partition. Yes, that would
'work' -- but again, do any of us here think mr "vp" is even remotely
capable (given what we've seen posted) of accomplishing this trick?

>> And, if your estimate is correct (windows user tinkering with Linux)
>> then do you honestly think a "windows user tinkering with Linux" would
>> ever pull off installing Linux to any of FAT32, VFAT, or NTFS (at least
>> NTFS would come with permissions flags)?
>>
>> If your estimate is correct I would suggest that it would be nigh on
>> impossible for a general "windows user tinkering with Linux" to pull
>> off installing Linux onto a native MS filesystem.
>
> That might depend on how accomodating the installation system tries
> to be, but they certainly wouldn't accidentally set it up my way,
> running from RAM.

No, setting up for running from RAM would have to be explicitlly
provided by the installer before "clueless windows user" would get that
setup. Now that you mention this, I seem to recall some distro from
years ago that 'did' partly do this. It would create a giant disk
image as a file in Windows, format the disk image as ext4 (or might
have even been ext3 or ext2 days) and install Linux into the disk
image. Then there was some odd boot setup to be able to launch linux
and have it mount the windows file as its root drive. The 'value add'
was so that windows users did not need to repartition their windows
setup, they could just install in windows as if Linux were a windows
program, but still be able to boot Linux.

But even it did not "run from ram", it ran from that disk image by loop
mounting the image as /dev/sda (or might have been /dev/hda if this was
before the merger of the IDE disk subsystem into the SCSI subsystem).