gwr@linus.mitre.org (Gordon W. Ross) (10/19/90)
I know that ESIX (Everex Systems UNIX Sys.V/386) uses 0x63 as its
partition I.D. and I'm pretty sure that was unchanged from what ESIX
received from AT&T in the original UNIX distribution. (At least, the
name of a programmer from AT&T still appears in the boot sector
installed by the ESIX fdisk program.)
By the way, before you write yet another fdisk program, why not take a
look at the one I wrote. My excuse for writing yet another fdisk was
that I wanted one with ALL of the following features:
(1) handles partitions which extend beyond cyl 1024
(2) handles partitions with an arbitrary ID code
(3) save/restore a copy of the boot sector to/from a file
(4) does NOT use full-screen interface (so a script can run it)
(5) runs on UNIX, DOS, Minix, whatever...
(6) can be tested without touching the bootblock (for the paranoid)
(7) compatible with Sys.V/386 and DOS fdisk
(8) simple, small ("feature" 4 helps here)
Included with my fdisk program (called "pfdisk") are two alternative
boot programs (for the boot sector) which present a menu at boot time
and ask the user which partition to boot from. (Yes, I know of shoelace.
We developed at about the same time, but with different design goals.)
One boot program provides automatic partition selection (on timeout)
to allow unattended reboot. The other is smaller and lacks the
timeout feature but is compatible with SpeedStor. Both are < 512 bytes.
If anyone wants my "bootmenu" distribution (including "pfdisk") send
me mail and I'll mail the distribution to you. It also has been
posted (version 1.2) in comp.unix.sysv386 in early Sept. 1990.
--
Gordon W. Ross (M/S E095) internet: gwr@linus.mitre.org
The MITRE Corporation uucp: {decvax|philabs}!linus!gwr
Burlington Road office phone: 617-271-3205
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