fdisk

CFDISK(8)							 GNU fdisk Manual							 CFDISK(8)

NAME

       GNU fdisk, lfdisk, gfdisk - manipulate partition tables on a hard drive

SYNOPSIS

       fdisk [options] [device]

DESCRIPTION

       fdisk is a disk partition manipulation program, which allows you to create, destroy, resize, move and copy partitions on a hard drive using
       a menu-driven interface. It is useful for organising the disk space on a new drive, reorganising an old drive, creating space for new oper-
       ating  systems,	and  copying  data  to	new hard disks. For a list of the supported partition types, see the --list-partition-types option
       below.

       It comes in two variants, gfdisk and lfdisk. Lfdisk aims to resemble Linux fdisk 2.12, while gfdisk supports more advanced disk operations,
       like resizing the filesystem, moving and copying partitions. When starting fdisk, the default is to run gfdisk.

OPTIONS

       -h, --help
	      displays a help message.

       -v, --version
	      displays the program's version.

       -L, --linux-fdisk
	      turns on Linux fdisk compatibility mode. This is the same as running lfdisk.

       -G, --gnu-fdisk
	      turns off Linux fdisk compatibility mode.

       -i, --interactive
	      where necessary, prompts for user intervention.

       -p, --script
	      never prompts for user intervention.

       -l, --list
	      lists  the  partition  table  on	the specified device and exits. If there is no device specified, lists the partition tables on all
	      detected devices.

       -r, --raw-list
	      displays a hex dump of the partition table of the disk, similar to the way Linux fdisk displays the raw data in the partition table.

       -u, --sector-units
	      use sectors, instead of cylinders for a default unit.

       -s, --size=DEVICE
	      prints the size of the partition on DEVICE is printed on the standard output.

       -t, --list-partition-types
	      displays a list of supported partition types and features.

       The following options are available only to lfdisk.

       -b, --sector-size=SIZE
	      Specify the sector size of the disk. Valid values are 512, 1024 and 2048. Should be used only on older kernels,  which  don't  guess
	      the correct sector size.

       -C, --cylinders=CYLINDERS
	      Specify the number of cylinders of the disk. Currently does nothing, it is left for Linux fdisk compatibility.

       -H, --heads=HEADS
	      Specify the number of heads of the disk. Reasonable values are 255 or 16.

       -S, --sectors=SECTORS
	      Specify the number of sectors per track. A reasonable value is 63.

BUGS

       Before  editing	a  BSD disklabel, the partition with the disklabel should already exist on the disk and be detected by the OS. If you have
       created a BSD-type partition, you need to write the changes to the disk. If fdisk fails to notify the OS about the changes in partition ta-
       ble, you need to restart your computer. As fdisk tries to guess the device holding the BSD disklabel, it might fail to edit it at all, even
       if the OS has detected it. In this case you are adviced to simply open the device with fdisk directly. It is possible that it doesn't  work
       on some operating systems.

       Getting the size of a partition with -s might fail, if fdisk fails to guess the disk device, for the same reasons as with the previous bug.

SEE ALSO

       mkfs(8), cfdisk(8), parted(8) The fdisk program is fully documented in the info(1) format GNU fdisk User Manual manual.

fdisk								  18 August, 2006							 CFDISK(8)