>>>>> "sivart" == sivart <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
sivart> Hello all. Do any of the latest versions of linux contain
sivart> drivers for IOMEGA ZIP drives??? Sure would be nice to use
sivart> 100MB portable storage with linux...
I have one, it works great!
I've got a parallel port zip drive. When you configure the kernel,
with 'make xconfig', select for scsi support, scsi disk support and
then under 'low level drivers', select to build the IOMEGA driver.
I build all of those as modules, rather than building them into the
kernel, and run 'kerneld' at boot, by putting "auto" into
/etc/modules. (this is Debian specific.)
I found that the Zip driver, "ppa", works BEST as a module, since
when the module is loaded, either automagicly by 'kerneld' and
'modprobe', or with an explicit 'insmod', it initializes the device.
If it is compiled in, that only happens at boot time, and if the drive
is not plugged into the port, you cannot mount one later without
rebooting the computer. Whereas, as a module, 'ppa' will initialize
on loading the driver, allowing you to move the drive around at will.
In order to make it so that 'kerneld' can auto-load 'ppa', I had to
hand-edit /lib/modules/`uname -r'/modules.dep, after running 'depmod
-a' one time. (being certain that it is not run every boot.) For some
reason, a required dependancy was not added by the 'depmod' program.
The 'ppa.o' driver depends on 'sd_mod.o' and 'scsi_mod.o'
These are the relevant changes from the modules.dep file, YMMV:
8<----------------------------------------------------------------->8
161c161
< /lib/modules/2.0.27/scsi/ppa.o: /lib/modules/2.0.27/scsi/scsi_mod.o
---
> /lib/modules/2.0.27/scsi/ppa.o: /lib/modules/2.0.27/scsi/sd_mod.o
8<----------------------------------------------------------------->8
(... The line for sd_mod already contains the depend for scsi_mod, and
so it ref-cascades just fine.)
... And then, in '/etc/fstab', I have these lines:
8<----------------------------------------------------------------->8
/dev/sda1 /zip ext2 defaults,noauto,user,exec 0 1
/dev/sda4 /dzip msdos defaults,noauto,user 0 0
8<----------------------------------------------------------------->8
... Since Zip disks come from the factory partitioned as partition 4,
I assume here that DOS disks will retain that. When I make a disk
into a Linux disk, I run 'fdisk' on it and make the partition be
partition 1, then run 'mke2fs' on it.
(Someone mentioned that it is possible to use '/dev/sda', using the
"whole device", without partitioning it... I've never tried that.)
Now all you do is plug the drive into the parallel port, put the disk
in the drive, and then 'mount' it. Use 'mount /zip' for a Linux disk,
'mount /dzip' for a DOS one. You could add mount points for "vfat"
(Win95) filesystems, and whatever else as well.
While the disk's filesystem is mounted, the eject button is
disabled, and pressing it has no effect. When you 'umount' the disk,
it gets ejected if you have pressed the button, but not if you
haven't. After you've umounted the disk, 'kerneld' will unload the
driver for you after a minute of disuse.
There is a program, called 'ziptool', that allows you to set the
write protection on a Zip disk. It will also eject a disk under
software control. When you change the write protect, it ejects the
disk in order to make sure that things will get re-initialized by the
drive before you remount its filesystem. I seem to remember that I
found 'ziptool' on Sunsite, but if you cannot find it, let me know,
and I'll mail or 'sendfile' you a copy of it; I don't think the author
will mind that. It's documantation is the comment header; it is 'c'
source, and compiles in a jiff.
--
__ _ Karl M. Hegbloom <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
/ /(_)_ __ _ ___ __ http://www.inetarena.com/~karlheg
/ / | | '_ \| | | \ \/ / Portland, OR, USA
/ /__| | | | | |_| |> < Proudly running Linux 2.0.27 transname
\____/_|_| |_|\__,_/_/\_\ and Debian GNU public software!
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