ADC Home > Reference Library > Reference > Mac OS X > Mac OS X Man Pages

 

This document is a Mac OS X manual page. Manual pages are a command-line technology for providing documentation. You can view these manual pages locally using the man(1) command. These manual pages come from many different sources, and thus, have a variety of writing styles.

For more information about the manual page format, see the manual page for manpages(5).



NEWFS_MSDOS(8)            BSD System Manager's Manual           NEWFS_MSDOS(8)

NAME
     newfs_msdos -- construct a new MS-DOS (FAT) file system

SYNOPSIS
     newfs_msdos [-N] [-B boot] [-F FAT-type] [-I volid] [-O OEM] [-S sector-size] [-a FAT-size]
                 [-b block-size] [-c cluster-size] [-e dirents] [-f format] [-h heads] [-i info] [-k backup]
                 [-m media] [-n FATs] [-o hidden] [-r reserved] [-s total] [-u track-size] [-v volume-name]
                 special [disktype]

DESCRIPTION
     The newfs_msdos utility creates a FAT12, FAT16, or FAT32 file system on device special, using
     disktab(5) entry disktype to determine geometry, if required.

     The options are as follow:

     -N      Don't create a file system: just print out parameters.

     -B boot
             Get bootstrap from file.

     -F FAT-type
             FAT type (one of 12, 16, or 32).

     -I volid
             Volume ID.

     -O OEM  OEM string (up to 8 characters).  The default is "BSD  4.4".

     -S sector-size
             Number of bytes per sector.  Acceptable values are powers of 2 in the range 128 through 32768.

     -a FAT-size
             Number of sectors per FAT.

     -b block-size
             File system block size (bytes per cluster).  This should resolve to an acceptable number of
             sectors per cluster (see below).

     -c cluster-size
             Sectors per cluster.  Acceptable values are powers of 2 in the range 1 through 128.

     -e dirents
             Number of root directory entries (FAT12 and FAT16 only).

     -f format
             Specify a standard (floppy disk) format.  The eight standard formats are (capacities in kilo-bytes): kilobytes):
             bytes): 160, 180, 320, 360, 640, 720, 1200, 1232, 1440, 2880.

     -h heads
             Number of drive heads.

     -i info
             Location of the file system info sector (FAT32 only).  A value of 0xffff signifies no info sec-tor. sector.
             tor.

     -k backup
             Location of the backup boot sector (FAT32 only).  A value of 0xffff signifies no backup sector.

     -m media
             Media descriptor (acceptable range 0xf0 to 0xff).

     -n FATs
             Number of FATs.  Acceptable values are 1 to 16 inclusive.  The default is 2.

     -o hidden
             Number of hidden sectors.

     -r reserved
             Number of reserved sectors.

     -s total
             File system size.

     -u track-size
             Number of sectors per track.

     -v volume-name
             Volume name (filesystem name), up to 11 characters.  The name should consist of only those
             characters permitted in regular DOS (8+3) filenames.

NOTES
     FAT file system parameters occupy a "Boot Sector BPB (BIOS Parameter Block)" in the first of the
     "reserved" sectors which precede the actual file system.  For reference purposes, this structure is
     presented below.

     struct bsbpb {
         u_int16_t   bps;            /* [-S] bytes per sector */
         u_int8_t    spc;            /* [-c] sectors per cluster */
         u_int16_t   res;            /* [-r] reserved sectors */
         u_int8_t    nft;            /* [-n] number of FATs */
         u_int16_t   rde;            /* [-e] root directory entries */
         u_int16_t   sec;            /* [-s] total sectors */
         u_int8_t    mid;            /* [-m] media descriptor */
         u_int16_t   spf;            /* [-a] sectors per FAT */
         u_int16_t   spt;            /* [-u] sectors per track */
         u_int16_t   hds;            /* [-h] drive heads */
         u_int32_t   hid;            /* [-o] hidden sectors */
         u_int32_t   bsec;           /* [-s] big total sectors */
     };
     /* FAT32 extensions */
     struct bsxbpb {
         u_int32_t   bspf;           /* [-a] big sectors per FAT */
         u_int16_t   xflg;           /* control flags */
         u_int16_t   vers;           /* file system version */
         u_int32_t   rdcl;           /* root directory start cluster */
         u_int16_t   infs;           /* [-i] file system info sector */
         u_int16_t   bkbs;           /* [-k] backup boot sector */
     };

EXAMPLES
           newfs_msdos /dev/disk0s1
     Create a file system, using default parameters, on /dev/disk0s1.

           newfs_msdos -f 1440 -v foo fd0
     Create a standard 1.44M file system, with volume name "foo", on /dev/fd0.

SEE ALSO
     fdisk(8), mount(8)

DIAGNOSTICS
     Exit status is 0 on success and 1 on error.

HISTORY
     The newfs_msdos command appeared in FreeBSD 3.0.

AUTHORS
     Robert Nordier <rnordier@FreeBSD.org>.

BSD                              July 6, 1998                              BSD

Did this document help you?
Yes: Tell us what works for you.
It’s good, but: Report typos, inaccuracies, and so forth.
It wasn’t helpful: Tell us what would have helped.