guess_fstype from busybox
guess_fstype is a small utility to - well, "guess" the "filesystem" that resides in a given block device. It is used extensively in Puppy Linux and its variants including Fatdog. Its job is so important that if you have a malfunctioning binary then most of desktop filesystem operations will cease to work correctly.guess_fstype was originally cobbled from guess_fstype_* functions from mount.c in util-linux (long before util-linux had blkid), it came from the same set of functions which powers "mount --guess-fstype" (which also gives the binary its name).
Over time, more and more filesystem type detections got added, and the code becomes more and more messier. It still works, and it still works beautifully, but it is not easy to maintain. So I began to search for a replacement.
klibc
klibc has an explicit standalone "fstype" binary, which is used to do exactly what guess_fstype does (but its output is different). It is small and fast and static - it's a good candidate. Unfortunately, its repertoire of filesystem detection is less than sterling - it lacks popular filesystems such as FAT and NTFS. While it can be patched to add those two, the point of my exercise is to try to *not* to maintain the detection code myself.
busybox
I turned on to busybox, which also has filesystem detection code. As it turns out, it is relatively easy to use them for a standalone application, and to my delight they are rather complete too. So I created a patch that will create a guess_fstype-equivalent from busybox.
To use the patch:
1. Extract vanilla busybox 1.21 source
2. Apply the patch (get it from here)
3. Go to the volume-id directory
4. Type "make"
5. You will end-up with a bb_guess_fstype which can be renamed to guess_fstype for proper use.
Busybox's guess_fstype recognises less than the original Puppy's busybox, but I don't think this is a problem as what it lacks are "exotic" filesystems anyway (everyone ever user xiafs recently?
) and would be very rarely used, if ever, indeed.
You can fine-tune the filesystem to detect by editing the fake_libbb.h (removing the defines) as well as the Makefile (removing the object code from being linked in).
When new version of busybox is released, all that I need to do is to update this patch. There will be no need to separately maintain the filesystem detection code anymore. As for now, I actually included the f2fs filesystem detection code in the patch, but as soon as this is supported by busybox natively, it will be dropped.
This new guess_fstype will be in the next version of Fatdog.
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Comments:
Posted on 10 Jun 2013, 1:06 by jamesbond"Converted into busybox applet"
Ibidem (Isaac) took my patch and turned it into a busybox applet. Superb! Next time we can configure it as part of standard busybox configuration and compilation.
Patch is located in Puppy Linux forum, here.
The post after that also offers a patch to enable minimalist 'nroff' applet in busybox. Cool!
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