Subject: Re: Detaching live sd devices
To: Steven M. Bellovin <smb@cs.columbia.edu>
From: Bill Studenmund <wrstuden@netbsd.org>
List: tech-kern
Date: 07/25/2005 12:24:57
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On Mon, Jul 25, 2005 at 01:26:24PM -0400, Steven M. Bellovin wrote:
> In message <20050725171652.GA26608@kyyhky.embedtronics.fi>, Jukka Marin w=
rites:
> >On Mon, Jul 25, 2005 at 09:32:14AM -0700, Bill Studenmund wrote:
> >> Why not just unmount the stick before disconnecting it?
> >
> >No modern operating system should have the user do things like this unle=
ss
> >he/she has a specific reason for it.  The users don't even know what
> >mounting a disk means.
>=20
> Of course, DOS/Windows has gone the other way -- you never needed to=20
> tell the OS anything when you removed a floppy drive, but you do need=20
> to "stop" a USB disk or PCMCIA device before removal.  I believe the=20
> same is true on MacOS.
>=20
> In other words, maybe people shouldn't have to do it, but on most=20
> modern systems they do; it's not a new concept except, perhaps, for the=
=20
> word "unmount".

I agree. While I think the user should have to go through a manual step, I=
=20
think that we can make it easy for them. The "eject" command will do an=20
unmount if you pass it the -f option. So it shouldn't be hard to create a=
=20
tool that can help users eject media. :-)

Take care,

Bill

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