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Bug#355108: if parted gives an error (or doesn't know) about a partition table, partman will erase it



severity 355108 normal
thanks

On Fri, Mar 03, 2006 at 11:42:52AM +0100, Sven Luther wrote:

> Well, it seems that in some rare case (two example below) either libparted
> will issue an error or not know about a given partition table.

> In these cases, the installer will think there is no partition table, and
> propose the creation of a new one, erasing the old partition table, and thus
> causing the total loss of all data previously found on the harddisk.

If it *proposes* the creation of a new partition table, then obviously this
is still under control of the user.  Overwriting data when the user tells
you to is not "data loss" for the purpose of bug severities.

> A proposal to fix this would be to create a partman-kernel or whatever,
> which would be called if libparted fails, and then go looking at
> /proc/partitions, to see if there are partitions there, and propose a
> read-only partition setup, which would allow the user to install in
> existing partition, and more importanly don't let him to silently
> over-write existing partition tables.

I think this is an interesting idea, at least.  However, consider that one
of the reasons why parted will reject a current partition table as invalid
is due to overlapping partitions...

-- 
Steve Langasek                   Give me a lever long enough and a Free OS
Debian Developer                   to set it on, and I can move the world.
vorlon@debian.org                                   http://www.debian.org/

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