File Formats - HFS & XFS
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Hi,
I notice that partclone supports HFS & XFS.
Any way to have the version of partclone that comes with FOG to be updated and support these features ?
It would help with Apple machines (hfs) & CentOS 7 (now default to xfs)Thanks
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FOG 1.3.0 RC can already capture from those. Just not as resizable.
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@latelier Which version of FOG do you use? Even FOG 1.2.0 supports HFS (I know because back at my old working place we imaged Macminis with FOG 1.2.0)! Not exactly sure when XFS support was added but as Wayne said the RC version definitely does support XFS already (and still HFS).
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Oh I see…
I thought that when partclone was falling back to “raw” for the transfers it was not fully supported.
I guess partclone does not support partitions on those file systems yet ?
It’s a bummer to copy 1TB when there’s only 10GB on the actual drive… -
@latelier Non-resizeable just means that the resulting image will require a 1TB hard drive or greater to deploy to. The captured image will likely be less than 10GB.
Capturing in RAW would probably end up with a really large image, on the other hand.
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Strange thing also.
On a MacMini with 1 drive and Fog settings at “All Disks, Multi Partition” it says “HFS” while transferring.
On iMac with their so called “Fusion Drives” which is actually 2 drives (1 SSD & 1 HD) with the exact same FOG settings, it says “RAW” while transferring.
I don’t see any difference in the end thought.
And you’re right, the image size is not the total disk space but the actual partition used space.Too bad it still scans the whole 1TB, it takes about 2 hours to clone an iMac.
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Never mind, I think I figured it out regarding the iMac.
I just noticed that it does copy small HFS & FAT32 partitions besides the 2 big RAW ones. (It passes really fast)
The data allocation information is probably stored there and the 2 RAW partitions are the main data.
Because you never actually see these 2 drives, it’s all hidden to the user (typical Apple way).
It’s probably how they manage those “Fusion Drives”.
Anyway, seems to make sense regarding the iMac issue.Although for Linux XFS partitions, it does say “RAW” while transferring, that’s what threw me off.
I guess it’s not an “issue” if there’s just no way for partclone (for now) to copy XFS partitions like it can for EXT4. -
@latelier What FOG version are you on? I’m thinking you’re on 1.2
XFS support was only added in Trunk I believe.
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Our version is not really old
FOG Trunk 7945.
I could try to update, are you saying that full XFS support (resizable) is suppose to be available ? -
@latelier said in File Formats - HFS & XFS:
Because you never actually see these 2 drives, it’s all hidden to the user (typical Apple way).
It’s probably how they manage those “Fusion Drives”.A good reason to not have fusion drives. I want to control my computer, not the other way around.
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@latelier 7945 is several months old, not sure if XFS quite made it at that point. For the actual XFS partition it should be capturing under XFS mode, not RAW.
I don’t believer resizeable is an option for XFS, though, but could be wrong.
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@Wayne-Workman said in File Formats - HFS & XFS:
A good reason to not have fusion drives. I want to control my computer, not the other way around.
Yep, unfortunately they come bundle with the iMacs…
There’s no way out
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Move to the latest RC please, see how that goes.
Additionally, the latest RC has support for net booting Macs - if you’re running DHCP on your FOG server that is.
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@Quazz said in File Formats - HFS & XFS:
@latelier 7945 is several months old, not sure if XFS quite made it at that point. For the actual XFS partition it should be capturing under XFS mode, not RAW.
I don’t believer resizeable is an option for XFS, though, but could be wrong.
Ok thanks, I’ll give it a shot.
I’ll try to update to the latest Trunk version and see if it transfers in XFS. -
@Wayne-Workman said in File Formats - HFS & XFS:
Move to the latest RC please, see how that goes.
Additionally, the latest RC has support for net booting Macs - if you’re running DHCP on your FOG server that is.
Thanks for the info.
We had OSX net bootin working on our current FOG implementation but we had to modify DHCP config files.
Maybe with this update that fix is not required. -
@latelier said in File Formats - HFS & XFS:
Maybe with this update that fix is not required.
Please let us know how it goes.
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Sorry I mixed that up. You can expand, you can’t shrink. At least not yet.
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I just wanted to take a minute to share what I know about this subject.
XFS
Does not have the ability to shrink period. It can only grow. The only possible solution is to do a file backup using something like xfsdump, then recreate the filesystem. Or make the smallest partition possible when you first install, then grow after imaging.OSX
There is nothing special about fusion drives, the issue is that fusion drives are coupled with OSX’s core storage feature. Core storage is basically lvm for mac. When using a fusion drive a volume group is created and spread across the two drives, giving you added speed on the ssd portion. I assure you the drive is not hidden and you still control over your drives. It just appears as one drive. You will most likely never be able to image core storage from a linux environment except as raw. It’s like when you want to capture lvm on linux you need to active the lvm first or it will be captured as raw, the only problem is there is no way to activate core storage on linux.Hope that helps.
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@latelier There has been a dicussion on core storage before: https://forums.fogproject.org/topic/7990/apple-fusion-drive/3
As I said in the other thread it should be possible to add core storage/LVM support to FOG. Anyone keen to join this “subproject”? I might be having some time to do that in winter. But only if someone who wants to use it is part of it.
See here on how to convert a core storage drive to normal HFS+ volumes without data loss in just a few seconds (I’ve tested this a couple of times without ever seeing an issue!): http://awesometoast.com/yosemite-core-storage-and-partition-woes/