Confused about ntfs safe(?) read-write

zonkers · 05-14-2004, 11:17 AM

Im really confused about whether its safe to enable writing to ntfs drives or not. i have mandrake 10, must be kernel 2.6 that supposedly supports writing to the ntfs drives, but then in other threads i read that this is experimental, unsafe, and so on. So, -can i enable writing to these drives as sleep well at night, or would this be a horrible mistake?

Demonbane · 05-14-2004, 11:38 AM

At this point ntfs write support in kernel 2.6 is actually quite safe, but only limited to overwriting files with the same length, and does not support adding or deleting files.
So to sum it up, its useless.

qwijibow · 05-14-2004, 11:53 AM

eh ?

i thought it was only useless in 2.6 kernels.

the kernel read-me's say full read / write support is safe in 2.6

Demonbane · 05-14-2004, 12:25 PM

There's so much you can do when you are unable to change the file length or create/delete files.

qwijibow · 05-15-2004, 06:54 PM

oops, i meant to say 2.4.

the kernel read me says that full read-write support works fine and safe in 2.6 kernels.

i think perhaps you are confused about the difference between 2.4 and 2.6 kernels

Demonbane · 05-15-2004, 08:02 PM

This from the linux-ntfs FAQ:

Quote:

There are two drivers, currently. The original driver, in 2.4 has some write code in it, but it is extremely dangerous to use it. The possibility of destroying your filesystem is very high.

The new driver, introduced in 2.5.11, has some write code, but it's very limited. The driver can overwrite existing files, but it cannot change the length, add new or delete existing files.

qwijibow · 05-16-2004, 06:55 PM

yes, and in 2.6. it is safe.

safe ntfs writing is quite new.... only a few months old.
there are still alot of out-dated information out there.

how old is the 2.5.11 kernel ???
were on 2.6.6 now.

Demonbane · 05-16-2004, 09:29 PM

*sigh*
This is what it says in the kernel 2.6.6 help file for NTFS write support:

Quote:

CONFIG_NTFS_RW:

This enables the partial, but safe, write support in the NTFS driver.

The only supported operation is overwriting existing files, without
changing the file length. No file or directory creation, deletion or
renaming is possible. Note only non-resident files can be written to
so you may find that some very small files (<500 bytes or so) cannot
be written to.

While we cannot guarantee that it will not damage any data, we have
so far not received a single report where the driver would have
damaged someones data so we assume it is perfectly safe to use.

Note: While write support is safe in this version (a rewrite from
scratch of the NTFS support), it should be noted that the old NTFS
write support, included in Linux 2.5.10 and before (since 1997),
is not safe.

This is currently useful with TopologiLinux. TopologiLinux is run
on top of any DOS/Microsoft Windows system without partitioning your
hard disk. Unlike other Linux distributions TopologiLinux does not
need its own partition. For more information see
<http://topologi-linux.sourceforge.net/>

It is perfectly safe to say N here.