gpart: No partitioning scheme found
reddit / freebsd

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idude0407 · 2023-07-25 10:51

I installed FreeBSD13.2 on hard a 500G hard drive.  I did a manual
partitioning using gpart, and it worked just fine, but left 171G on
the hard drive of free space to create a ms-basic-data partition later
on.


    =>       40  625142368  diskid/DISK-0000AB1236A0  GPT  (298G)
             40     532480                         1  efi  (260M)
         532520       1024                         2  freebsd-boot
(512K)
         533544        984                            - free -  (492K)
         534528   25165824                         3  freebsd-swap
(12G)
       25700352  241172480                         4  freebsd-zfs
(115G)
      266872832  358269576                            - free -  (171G)


Doing some searching, I found out that gpart accepts only objects of
class PART.  The above info tells me that the disk is of object class
DISK only even though I used gpart to create it, I'm a bit confused
here.  To make things short, how do I create another partition using
the free space that I have left on the disk?  Can I make the disk of
class PART also, so I can use gpart?

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grahamperrin · 2023-07-25 14:59

I'm an infrequent user of [gpart\(8\)](https://man.freebsd.org/cgi/man
.cgi?query=gpart&sektion=8&manpath=freebsd-release) (I prefer a
utility with more integral guidance), so I can't write
authoritatively.

That said: at a glance, I see nothing wrong with the end result that's
tabled above. I see a device with a GPT, with four partitions and two
areas of free space.

I guess that what you did was comparable to the first part of *GPT*
under [EXAMPLES](https://man.freebsd.org/cgi/man.cgi?query=gpart&sekti
on=8&manpath=freebsd-release#EXAMPLES).

gpart should be usable for creation of the additional partition.

Re: understandings of objects and classes, no comment from me other
than a reference to [geom\(4\)](https://man.freebsd.org/cgi/man.cgi?qu
ery=geom&sektion=4&manpath=freebsd-release).

HTH

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FUZxxl · 2023-07-25 15:45

gpart add -s 171G -t ms-basic-data diskid/DISK-0000AB1236A0

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grahamperrin · 2023-07-25 19:33

Thanks,

> `gpart add -s 171G -t ms-basic-data diskid/DISK-0000AB1236A0`

Theoretically, what would be the purpose of specifying an index number
when adding a partition?

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FUZxxl · 2023-07-25 19:36

Partition indices need not to be contiguous.  You can assign any
unused partition index to a new partition.

> Can there be an index number that's not associated with a partition,
before adding a partition at the index?

Yes.  This is true for any partition index for which no partition
exists.

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grahamperrin · 2023-07-25 19:44

> … any partition index for which no partition exists.

I struggle to visualise this, I mean, how it would appear in output
from `gpart show`.

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FUZxxl · 2023-07-25 20:23

E.g. you could have a partition 1 and a partition 4 with no partitions
2 and 3.

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grahamperrin · 2023-07-25 20:46

I probably threw a bunch of words from the manual page and elsewhere
into the tumble drier in my head … hardly surprising that I couldn't
make sense of what fell out when I opened the door. Confused myself
with this imaginary partition index number without a partition:

    =>       40  625142368  diskid/DISK-0000AB1236A0  GPT  (298G)
             40     532480                         1  efi  (260M)
         532520       1024                         2  freebsd-boot
(512K)
         533544        984                            - free -  (492K)
         534528   25165824                         3  freebsd-swap
(12G)
       25700352  241172480                         4  freebsd-zfs
(115G)
      266872832  358269576                         6
(171G)

It's nonsense, of course.

----

/u/idude0407 sorry for the thread hijack.

/u/FUZxxl non-contiguity is understandable. Thanks again.

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idude0407 · 2023-07-25 23:33

That did the trick, but I have no idea how to format it to fat32 or
NTFS, since `/dev` doesn't contain any devices for
diskid/DISK-0000AB1236A0.

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idude0407 · 2023-07-26 00:39

I was able to format it using `diskid/DISK-0000AB1236A0p5` as my
device but I can't mount it using.

`mount_msdosfs diskid/DISK-0000AB1236A0p5 /mnt`

I get this error:

**mount\_msdosfs: diskid/DISK-0000AB1236A0p5: Invalid fstype: Invalid
argument**

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FUZxxl · 2023-07-26 07:01

You need to mount using the full path, e.g.

    mount -t msdosfs /dev/diskid/DISK-0000AB1236A0p5 /mnt

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idude0407 · 2023-07-26 09:41

Got it.  It took forever to mount it, but it did mount.  I must have
missed that directory in /dev. Now everything makes sense!