[gentoo-user] [OT] Accessing Linux filesystems from Windows with Crossmeta

[gentoo-user] [OT] Accessing Linux filesystems from Windows with Crossmeta

[Heinz Sporn]

Hi all!

Yesterday I stumbled over this project Crossmeta at
http://www.crossmeta.com/ that claims nothing less but having developed
Windows filesystem drivers for EXT, XFS, Reiser and so forth. I
immediatley downloaded everything that is there to download (for free)
but having difficulties to get it run.

Unfortunately after googling around for a bit I am not quite sure in
what shape this project actually is. So I'm wondering if there's someone
out there who is willing and able to help me out.

To the problem:

I strictly followed the instructions in crossmeta_jumpstart.pdf and
everything installed fine so far. What I don't understand are the
procedures one has to perform to mount an existing Linux XFS partition.
It looks as if you'd only have to run something like
"mount -t extfs /dev/daxxx /mnt" in a DOS-box but the only thing I get
is "mount: /mnt" and dmesg shows a couple of XFS related errors although
I properly installed the filesystem add-ons - xfs.sys and the others are
there. So in the moment I really have no clue how to continue.

Regards 

spox

-- 
Mit freundlichen Grüßen

Heinz Sporn

SPORN it-freelancing

Mobile:  ++43 (0)699 / 127 827 07
Email:   heinz.sporn@sporn-it.com
         heinz.sporn@utanet.at
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         A-4540 Bad Hall
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Re: [gentoo-user] [OT] Accessing Linux filesystems from Windows with Crossmeta

[Heinz Sporn]

Noone's interested in this? Are you kidding me? ;-)

Well, in the end I got this thing running and I now have read and
*write* access to an XFS partition from Windows.

If someone else want's to give it a try I have a couple of suggestions:

1. After installing the core server and the add-on filesystems reboot
your machine anyway.

2. The cxvfs services will not be loaded automatically afterwards -
which is good because it allows you to make a copy of the rootfs.img
file created during the installation process. Why? Because I had faced a
couple of blue screens during the test phase when trying to restart
cxvfs services and unmounting partitions. Not hard reproducable though.
After such a failure the cxvfs server wants you to fschk rootfs.img
which simply does not work somehow. Does not matter - rootfs.img is just
an entry point to your actual Linux partition.

3. To mount your stuff use a script like this:
@echo off

if exist v:\ goto :DONE

e:
cd \programme\crossmeta

copy /y rootfs.img.org rootfs.img

net start cxvfsmgr
net start xfs
set path=%path%;e:\programme\crossmeta\v-drive\bin
mount -a
mount -t xfs -o ro /dev/da0s3 /mnt

:DONE

Where E: is the drive where Windows resides, rootfs.img.org is a virgin
rootfs.img as mentioned in 2., /dev/da0s3 is my /dev/hda4 and finally e:
\programme\crossmeta\v-drive is a copy of the content of V:\ - i.e. the
virtual drive that cxvfs creates when loaded.

Stabilitiy?
I neither do need the write capability nor the NFS server emulation. I
only tested write access once - which worked - but can't say anything
about reliablility. What I do is mounting foreign partitions on demand,
retrieving data I need and leaving them mounted until I shut down
Windows. For that crossmeta didn't give me any headaches yet.

Have fun!

Am Freitag, den 04.11.2005, 07:46 +0100 schrieb Heinz Sporn:
> Hi all!
> 
> Yesterday I stumbled over this project Crossmeta at
> http://www.crossmeta.com/ that claims nothing less but having developed
> Windows filesystem drivers for EXT, XFS, Reiser and so forth. I
> immediatley downloaded everything that is there to download (for free)
> but having difficulties to get it run.
> 
> Unfortunately after googling around for a bit I am not quite sure in
> what shape this project actually is. So I'm wondering if there's someone
> out there who is willing and able to help me out.
> 
> To the problem:
> 
> I strictly followed the instructions in crossmeta_jumpstart.pdf and
> everything installed fine so far. What I don't understand are the
> procedures one has to perform to mount an existing Linux XFS partition.
> It looks as if you'd only have to run something like
> "mount -t extfs /dev/daxxx /mnt" in a DOS-box but the only thing I get
> is "mount: /mnt" and dmesg shows a couple of XFS related errors although
> I properly installed the filesystem add-ons - xfs.sys and the others are
> there. So in the moment I really have no clue how to continue.
> 
> Regards 
> 
> spox
> 
> -- 
> Mit freundlichen Grüßen
> 
> Heinz Sporn
> 
> SPORN it-freelancing
> 
> Mobile:  ++43 (0)699 / 127 827 07
> Email:   heinz.sporn@sporn-it.com
>          heinz.sporn@utanet.at
> Website: http://www.sporn-it.com
> Snail:   Steyrer Str. 20
>          A-4540 Bad Hall
>          Austria / Europe
> 
-- 
Mit freundlichen Grüßen

Heinz Sporn

SPORN it-freelancing

Mobile:  ++43 (0)699 / 127 827 07
Email:   heinz.sporn@sporn-it.com
         heinz.sporn@utanet.at
Website: http://www.sporn-it.com
Snail:   Steyrer Str. 20
         A-4540 Bad Hall
         Austria / Europe

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Re: [gentoo-user] [OT] Accessing Linux filesystems from Windows with Crossmeta

[Billy Holmes]

Heinz Sporn wrote:
> Noone's interested in this? Are you kidding me? ;-)

haha.. I don't run windows in a situation where I have to access files 
from a physical drive. I rarely run windows at all, actually.

> Well, in the end I got this thing running and I now have read and
> *write* access to an XFS partition from Windows.

I *do* think this is very cool. Perhaps you should create a wiki entry 
with this information?

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