format.dat(4) File Formats format.dat(4)NAMEformat.dat - disk drive configuration for the format command
DESCRIPTIONformat.dat enables you to use your specific disk drives with for‐
mat(1M). On Solaris 2.3 and compatible systems, format will automati‐
cally configure and label SCSI drives, so that they need not be defined
in format.dat. Three things can be defined in the data file:
· search paths
· disk types
· partition tables.
Syntax
The following syntax rules apply to the data file:
· The pound # sign is the comment character. Any text on a line
after a pound sign is not interpreted by format.
· Each definition in the format.dat file appears on a single logical
line. If the definition is more than one line long, all but the
last line of the definition must end with a backslash (\).
· A definition consists of a series of assignments that have an
identifier on the left side and one or more values on the right
side. The assignment operator is the equal sign (=). Assignments
within a definition must be separated by a colon (:).
· White space is ignored by format(1M). If you want an assigned
value to contain white space, enclose the entire value in double
quotes ("). This will cause the white space within quotes to be
preserved as part of the assignment value.
· Some assignments can have multiple values on the right hand side.
Separate values by a comma (,).
Keywords
The data file contains disk definitions that are read in by format(1M)
when it starts up. Each definition starts with one of the following
keywords: search_path, disk_type, and partition.
search_path 4.x: Tells format which disks it should search for when
it starts up. The list in the default data file con‐
tains all the disks in the GENERIC configuration file.
If your system has disks that are not in the GENERIC
configuration file, add them to the search_path defini‐
tion in your data file. The data file can contain only
one search_path definition. However, this single defi‐
nition lets you specify all the disks you have in your
system.
5.x: By default, format(1M) understands all the logical
devices that are of the form /dev/rdsk/cntndnsn; hence
search_path is not normally defined on a 5.x system.
disk_type Defines the controller and disk model. Each disk_type
definition contains information concerning the physical
geometry of the disk. The default data file contains
definitions for the controllers and disks that the
Solaris operating environment supports. You need to add
a new disk_type only if you have an unsupported disk.
You can add as many disk_type definitions to the data
file as you want.
The following controller types are supported by for‐
mat(1M):
XY450 Xylogics 450 controller (SMD)
XD7053 Xylogics 7053 controller (SMD)
SCSI True SCSI (CCS or SCSI-2)
ISP-80 IPI panther controller
The keyword itself is assigned the name of the disk
type. This name appears in the disk's label and is used
to identify the disk type whenever format(1M) is run.
Enclose the name in double quotes to preserve any white
space in the name.
Below are lists of identifiers for supported con‐
trollers. Note that an asterisk ('*') indicates the
identifier is mandatory for that controller -- it is
not part of the keyword name.
The following identifiers are assigned values in all
disk_type definitions:
acyl* alternate cylinders
asect alternate sectors per track
atrks alternate tracks
fmt_time formatting time per cylinder
ncyl* number of logical cylinders
nhead* number of logical heads
nsect* number of logical sectors per
track
pcyl* number of physical cylinders
phead number of physical heads
psect number of physical sectors per
track
rpm* drive RPM
These identifiers are for SCSI and MD-21 Controllers
read_retries page 1 byte 3 (read retries)
write_retries page 1 byte 8 (write retries)
cyl_skew page 3 bytes 18-19 (cylinder skew)
trk_skew page 3 bytes 16-17 (track skew)
trks_zone page 3 bytes 2-3 (tracks per zone)
cache page 38 byte 2 (cache parameter)
prefetch page 38 byte 3 (prefetch parameter)
max_prefetch page 38 byte 4 (minimum prefetch)
min_prefetch page 38 byte 6 (maximum prefetch)
Note: The Page 38 values are device-specific. Refer the
user to the particular disk's manual for these values.
For SCSI disks, the following geometry specifiers may
cause a mode select on the byte(s) indicated:
asect page 3 bytes 4-5 (alternate sectors per
zone)
atrks page 3 bytes 8-9 (alt. tracks per logi‐
cal unit)
phead page 4 byte 5 (number of heads)
psect page 3 bytes 10-11 (sectors per track)
And these identifiers are for SMD Controllers Only
bps* bytes per sector (SMD)
bpt* bytes per track (SMD)
Note: under SunOS 5.x, bpt is only required for SMD
disks. Under SunOS 4.x, bpt was required for all disk
types, even though it was only used for SMD disks.
And this identifier is for XY450 SMD Controllers Only
drive_type* drive type (SMD) (just call this "xy450
drive type")
partition Defines a partition table for a specific disk type. The
partition table contains the partitioning information,
plus a name that lets you refer to it in format(1M).
The default data file contains default partition defi‐
nitions for several kinds of disk drives. Add a parti‐
tion definition if you repartitioned any of the disks
on your system. Add as many partition definitions to
the data file as you need.
Partition naming conventions differ in SunOS 4.x and in
SunOS 5.x.
4.x: the partitions are named as a, b, c, d, e, f, g,
h.
5.x: the partitions are referred to by numbers 0, 1, 2,
3, 4, 5, 6, 7.
EXAMPLES
Example 1: A sample disk_type and partition.
Following is a sample disk_type and partition definition in format.dat
file for SUN0535 disk device.
disk_type = "SUN0535" \
: ctlr = SCSI : fmt_time = 4 \
: ncyl = 1866 : acyl = 2 : pcyl = 2500 : nhead = 7 : nsect = 80 \
: rpm = 5400
partition = "SUN0535" \
: disk = "SUN0535" : ctlr = SCSI \
: 0 = 0, 64400 : 1 = 115, 103600 : 2 = 0, 1044960 : 6 = 300, 876960
FILES
/etc/format.dat default data file if format -x is not
specified, nor is there a format.dat
file in the current directory.
SEE ALSOformat(1M)
System Administration Guide: Basic Administration
SunOS 5.10 19 Apr 2001 format.dat(4)
