version 1, including all changes.
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perry |
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ACTIVATE |
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!!!ACTIVATE |
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NAME |
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SYNOPSIS |
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DESCRIPTION |
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OPTIONS |
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BUGS |
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AUTHOR |
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SEE ALSO |
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---- |
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!!NAME |
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activate - read/write flags marking active boot partition |
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!!SYNOPSIS |
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__/sbin/activate__ ''device'' |
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show which partition is currently marked active on |
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device__ |
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/sbin/activate__ ''device partition'' |
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mark specified partition as active on given |
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device |
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!!DESCRIPTION |
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__activate__ is a simple program which sets the partition |
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which will be used to boot the system. To be precise, it |
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sets a flag in the partition table of the hard disk. This |
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may or may not have an effect on the bootup procedure. PC |
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booting is complicated, and this manual page does not |
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attempt to explain it; for more information on what |
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partition you should set active, you should consult the |
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documentation for your bootloader (an example bootloader is |
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__lilo,__ which has a good manual in /usr/share/doc/lilo/ |
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on Debian systems). |
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Note that programs such as __fdisk__ will also allow you |
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to set the active partition; it is probably better to use |
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one of these, since they generally provide services such as |
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allowing you to view the partition table before picking |
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which partition to activate, and provide opportunity to |
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confirm actions before writing to the partition table. |
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However, these programs have more checking for 'wrong' |
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values; for instance, they might not allow you to set the |
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active flag on an extended partition (because this is |
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generally a bad idea). __activate__, on the other hand, |
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assumes you really do know what you're doing and doesn't |
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have any bothersome prompts or sanity checks. In particular, |
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__activate__ makes ''no'' checks that the device you |
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give has a partition table on it at all! If you specify the |
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wrong device it will happily write garbage to |
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it. |
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!!OPTIONS |
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''device'' should be a block device such as /dev/hda. |
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Note that it does not make sense to give one of the |
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partition devices such as /dev/hda3. |
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''partition'' should be a number between 1 and 4 |
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specifying which partition should have the active flag |
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set. |
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If no partition number is given, activate will print out the |
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partition which is currently marked active. |
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!!BUGS |
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__activate__ should check that the device actually has a |
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partition table on it. |
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!!AUTHOR |
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Werner Almesberger (almesber@bernina.ethz.ch). |
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Peter Maydell (pmaydell@chiark.greenend.org.uk) wrote this |
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manual page. |
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!!SEE ALSO |
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lilo(8), fdisk(8) |
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__lilo__ comes with extensive documentation; this can be |
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found in /usr/share/doc/lilo/ on Debian |
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systems. |
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---- |
