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Moving files beetween Linux and Windows partitions

Hi everybody. I'm a new member very new to Linux and this is my first post.
I have just installed Suse 10.1 on a dual boot system on two different physical disks.
Linux recognizes all my Windows partitions on the first disk, and everything works ok, except two things.
First, I cannot move or save a file from my Linux partition to a Windows partition. When copying a file and trying to paste or move it to a Windows disc I get the following message: "could not make folder/windows/" or "could not write to/windows/" when trying to save it.
Any ideas?
The other problem is that something is probably wrong with the installation of the boot loader and the Linux OS is not visible by the computer during boot time. It goes straight to Windows unless I insert the Suse DVD and choose "boot from cd" and then "boot from hard disc" and finally choose Linux. Can I fix that or do I have to reinstall Linux?
Thanks in advance.

1) Many things can be wrong when trying to write to the Windows partition. First and foremost is that if you have 2000 or XP, the filesystem is NTFS, which linux doesn't write (normally) because it's not very reliable (i.e. you could seriously hose your windows partition). Typically you share things between Windows and linux by using a separate FAT32 partition. If you're having problems with that, you probably just need to modify you /etc/fstab file a bit to make it work.

2) It seems like the bootloader didn't install to the master boot record of the windows disk (either by your choice or otherwise). Now you have a decision to make: (1)swap the disks and fiddle with the grub settings to make the suse disk bootable and the windows disk bootable or (b)boot with your suse CD and then from suse type grub-install /dev/hda as root to install grub to the MBR on the windows disk. Note that /dev/hda is the first IDE hard drive. If you're using SATA hard drives, be sure to use /dev/sda instead. You can tell which you're using by typing fdisk -l from a root command line.

First of all Pljvaldez, thanks for your quick reply.
I formated a large Windows partition from to FAT32 with Partition Magic, and went back to Linux.
The disc and the format change are recognizable by Linux but when I try to see the contents of the disc I get the error "permissions denied". Is there anything I can do to change that?
Thanks

Can you post your /etc/fstab?

Usually you need a line like

Code:

/dev/hda4 /mnt/shared vfat defaults,user,rw,umask=000 0 0

Sometimes you can use uid=yourusername instead if umask doesn't work.

PHP Code:




/dev/hdc7            /                    reiserfs   acl,user_xattr        1 1 
/dev/hdc8            /home                reiserfs   acl,user_xattr        1 2 
/dev/sda1            /windows/C           ntfs       ro,users,gid=users,umask=00 
02,nls=utf8 0 0 
/dev/hdc5            /windows/D           ntfs       ro,users,gid=users,umask=00 
02,nls=utf8 0 0 
/dev/sda5            /windows/E           ntfs       ro,users,gid=users,umask=00 
02,nls=utf8 0 0 
/dev/hdc6            swap                 swap       defaults              0 0 
proc                 /proc                proc       defaults              0 0 
sysfs                /sys                 sysfs      noauto                0 0 
debugfs              /sys/kernel/debug    debugfs    noauto                0 0 
usbfs                /proc/bus/usb        usbfs      noauto                0 0 
devpts               /dev/pts             devpts     mode=0620,gid=5       0 0 
/dev/fd0             /media/floppy        auto       noauto,user,sync      0 0

dev/hdc5 windows/D is the disc that I have formatted in fat32 and I need to have full write and read access to.

I think if you change the following, it should work:

Quote:

Originally Posted by Homerous

Code:

/dev/hdc7            /                    reiserfs  acl,user_xattr        1 1

/dev/hdc8            /home                reiserfs  acl,user_xattr        1 2

/dev/sda1            /windows/C          ntfs      ro,users,gid=users,umask=00

02,nls=utf8 0 0

/dev/hdc5            /windows/D          vfat      rw,users,gid=users,umask=0000,nls=utf8 0 0

/dev/sda5            /windows/E          ntfs      ro,users,gid=users,umask=00

02,nls=utf8 0 0

/dev/hdc6            swap                swap      defaults              0 0

proc                /proc                proc      defaults              0 0

sysfs                /sys                sysfs      noauto                0 0

debugfs              /sys/kernel/debug    debugfs    noauto                0 0

usbfs                /proc/bus/usb        usbfs      noauto                0 0

devpts              /dev/pts            devpts    mode=0620,gid=5      0 0

/dev/fd0            /media/floppy        auto      noauto,user,sync      0 0

If you still have a problem, try using uid=yourusername instead of the gid option.

By the way, the umask for the NTFS partitions should be umask=0222 for read-only.