[luau] Ghost for Linux and Pattition Image

[W. Wayne Liauh]

I guess no one has used "partition image" yet.  Below is a brief 
description of this beta program:

*Description:* Partition Image is a Linux/UNIX utility which saves 
partitions in many formats (see below) to an image file. The image file 
can be compressed in the GZIP/BZIP2 formats to save disk space, and 
split into multiple files to be copied on removable floppies (ZIP for 
example), .... The partition can be saved across the network since 
version 0.6.0

*Supported file systems:*

    * *ReiserFS <http://www.namesys.com/>:*: a new journalized and
      powerful file system
    * *ext2fs/ext3fs <http://e2fsprogs.sourceforge.net/>:* the linux
      standard
    * *FAT16/32:* DOS & Windows file systems
    * *NTFS <http://linux-ntfs.sourceforge.net/>:* Windows NT and 2000
      File System (experimental support)
    * *JFS <http://oss.software.ibm.com/jfs/>:* Journalised File System,
      from IBM, used on Aix (beta support)
    * *XFS <http://oss.sgi.com/projects/xfs/>:* another journalized and
      efficient File System, from sgi, used on Irix (beta support)
    * *HPFS:* IBM OS/2 File System
    * *HFS:* Hierarchical File System: MacOS file systems (beta support)
    * *UFS:* Unix File System (Berkeley Fast File System: FFS, and
      Solaris File System are supported) (beta support)


Partition Image will only copy data from the used portions of the 
partition. For speed and efficiency, free blocks are not written to the 
image file. This is unlike the 'dd' command, which also copies empty 
blocks. Partition Image also works for large, very full partitions. For 
example, a full 1 GB partition can be compressed with gzip down to 400MB.

This is very useful to save partitions to an image in some cases:

    * First you can restore your linux partition if there is a problem
      (virus, file system errors, manipulation error). When you have a
      problem, you just have to restore the partition, and after 10
      minutes, you have the original partition. You can write the image
      to a CD-R if you don't want the image to use hard-disk space.
    * This utility can be used to install many identical PCs. For
      example, if you buy 50 PCs, with the same hardware, and you want
      to install the same linux systems on all 50 PCs, you will save a
      lot of time. Indeed, you just have to install on the first PC and
      create an image from it. For the 49 others, you can use the image
      file and Partition Image's restore function.




http://www.partimage.org/index.php3



Warren Togami wrote:

> bhoward at hale.org wrote:
>
>>>>>>>           
>>>>>>
>> Yep, several people I know who use ghost for mass deployment of NT and
>> other DOS family systems swear by it and tell me that they haven't
>> found any application "magic" numbers it couldn't handle (or that the
>> ghost development team couldn't make handle within a few days of
>> reporting a problem).
>>
>> MonMotha> However, on UNIX, I can't think of anything a specialized
>> MonMotha> program would offer over dd and netcat :)
>>
>> Maybe it just offers a degree of branding "security" for the novice
>> user and perhaps a little cleverness at figuring out things like the
>> blocksizes.
>>
>>                         Bruce
>>
>>  
>>
> Perhaps my understanding of these tools is inaccurate, but I thought 
> that nothing Open Source came close to the capabilities of tools like 
> Ghost.  For example, we have nothing like the multicasting features. 
> None of our tools are nearly as polished either.
>
>
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