Kernel 2.6.1 ad NTFS write...
 

Hi there,
i have just upgraded to the kernel 2.6.1. One of the reasons was, that I read it would support (limitted) write support for ntfs file systems.
As I am using the win boot manager (it's a company laptop), I don't want to boot Windows after I changed my kernel (what currently happens very often, as I am trying around with some other things). But without write support for ntfs file systems......
I have tried to mount it with write option:
mount -t ntfs -o rw <device> <mount point>

But copy of the bootsektor (same name, same size) did not work. I have tried 'cat' with redirection as well.......

Any idea how to solve this?

Thanks and regards!
McBrain

From what I have heard/read the NTFS write support is still somewhat experimental. You run the risk of erasing your data should you choose to dabble with it. Personally, I plan on partitioning again, and haveing 2 NTFS partitions, just to play with that, and not worry about corrupting the actual Windoze files.

From what I know, linux NTFS write support is very dangerous... the newest ntfs drivers DO support minimal writing capabilities, but that is only in the form of changing the contents of an existing file. Files cannot be created/deleted, and the file size must remain the same. MAny people are working on the ntfs project at sourceforge, but the ntfs filesystem is built like a DBMS!!

So, the best way to transfer information between windows and linux is to use a common FAT32 partition. Don't count on full NTFS write-support anytime soon.

=]

You want 100% read / write NTFS support with no chance of corrupting your windows file table? Use Captive. I use it and it works beautifully.

Link:
http://www.jankratochvil.net/project/captive/

There are issues with that project IIRC, because it uses the Windows ntfs.sys driver - people seem to think that MS will not take too kindly to this.

If you use the ntfs.sys from a legally registered copy of windows, they can't prosecute you. I don't care to read the EULA and tell you it is wrong, but I can tell you it works. And that is from my personal experience. What MS doesn't know won't hurt me.

There was above the point, that the write access of the new driver is very limitted. True, but it would do everything I need!
I want to overwrite one file on my NTFS partion which is always 512 byte, which is the bootsektor of my Linux partion, which is used by the Win2k boot manager.
I meanwhile got a little bit futher, because I found a switch for write access in the kernel configuration.
But that did not solve the problem finally, because I am still getting an error message (which I can't currently remember, but I will post it, when I am back to that system).
But I have read somewhere, that a further limittation is, that the file should have a minimum size. 512 byte is not very much!
Any ideas?

Thanks & regards