cerbero Posted June 23, 2002 Share Posted June 23, 2002 As some of you here might have seen, I'm thinking of buying a Mac. I would like to know some stuff about them though that I don't think I can ask about in a store really, so I was hoping someone here might be able to answer them... Here we go :) 1. How does the file system (in OSX, if that's any different from classic) look and work? Is it unix style, meaning that all partitions and drives are mounted under a root directory, or is it like windows/dos, that all partitions and drives have their own root directory? 2. How does one partition a hard drive on the mac? Do you boot from a cd that has those kinds of tools, or do you do it from within the OS? That's all I can think of right now.. I'll reply with more questions as they come to mind :) Thanks [EDIT] Oh and please, don't reply just to say "Duuhhh, Macs suck" or whatever... :confused: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dazzla Veteran Posted June 23, 2002 Veteran Share Posted June 23, 2002 The Mac system has partitions and drives are mounted at the root directory. As for partitioning. When you boot from teh OS X CD, there is a disk utility where you can erase, resize and create partitions. You can select pre-determined setups like 2 partitions, 3 partitions etc, or set it up yourself. Have a look at the image below, it's from within OS X so obviously most of it is blanked out, but you get the picture: In that image i've got it as one partition, although I usually have it as 2, 10GB for the System and Apps and 30GB for the Documents like MP3's, Movies etc etc. It's very easy to setup OS X exactly how you want. I've learned a great deal by browsing the Mac forums and I'd like to say I know quite a bit. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cerbero Posted June 23, 2002 Author Share Posted June 23, 2002 Wow. Great. That looks pretty advanced to be something that comes built into an os actually. The Mac system has partitions and drives are mounted at the root directory. Do they mount (by default) in something like the /mnt dir (of linux fame), or does the root dir contain nothing but the partitions and drives, something like this: <pre> / (root) Partition1 Dirs Partition2 Dirs CD-Rom Dirs </pre> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dazzla Veteran Posted June 23, 2002 Veteran Share Posted June 23, 2002 Yeah, that sounds right. They mount in a directory called "Volumes". They are layed out in the way you described. I'm not sure how I can show it. This is how it looks in column view, stemming from the drives and the network on the far left: I'm sure there's a command for the terminal which can show all this but I haven't got the hang of the unix commands yet. There is a program called Mox, i'm going to download it now and it shows all the hidden unix files. I'll post a screenie of that in a minute. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dazzla Veteran Posted June 23, 2002 Veteran Share Posted June 23, 2002 Right, I've got a couple of screenies. I'm not sure what they show :p :p : When I had multiple partitions, I had one called system and the other called Documents. When I was accessing them through the terminal, I went "cd VolumesDocuments" to switch to the other partition. I'm not sure if that means anything to you :D Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cerbero Posted June 23, 2002 Author Share Posted June 23, 2002 Yeah, I understand. Thanks a lot for your help. Now I want a mac even more. Can't wait to try OSX out next week :) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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