Option to use /dev values instead of UUID values

[Florian Diesch]

Liam Proven <lproven at gmail.com> writes:

> On Mon, Mar 15, 2010 at 5:23 PM, Dotan Cohen <dotancohen at gmail.com> wrote:
>>> It would be helpful if you gave your reasons for wanting this feature.
>>>
>>
>> I often have several bootable partitions, and if I have to edit fstab
>> by hand it is easier if the /dev values are used.

I'd prefer labels in this case.


> Well, yes, /dev/?d? entries *are* much easier to read than UUIDs.
> However, device names have several disadvantages, which are important.
> A UUID is a permanent, direct link to a particular partition. 

No, the important difference is that a UUID is an identifier for a *file
system* while a device name is an identifier for a *partition*.


> If you
> delete an earlier partition on the disk, or merge 2 of them or
> something like that, then /dev entries change. If you delete /dev/hda2
> then /dev/hda4 can become /dev/hda3 and so on, which can result in a
> non-bootable system. 

Once my former /home became /tmp after adding a new CD drive, and /tmp
was cleaned at boot time. I was wondering why booting took so long...


> UIIDs do not change & aren't affected by this.
>
> If you move a partition from one drive to another, the UUID goes with
> it - so move /home from /dev/sda to /dev/sdb and the fstab will still
> find it.

This only works if you really copy the file system (e.g. by using dd),
but not if you create a new file system (using mkfs) and copy the files.

AFAIR parted changes the UUID when moving or resizing partitions, too.



   Florian
-- 
<http://www.florian-diesch.de/software/easygconf/>