>>> Mount it with a loop device.
>>
>> Random, but... why the hell do you need a loopback "device" in the 
>> first place? Why can't you just mount (say) an ISO image directly? 
>> Requiring a loopback device means that
>>
>> 1. there are only a finite number of them available,
> 
> Have a look at this document:
>   http://www.slax.org/documentation_loop_mount.php
> 
> Here's how I understand the situation:
> 
> Linux kernels earlier than v. 2.6.23 had 8 loop devices, unless you 
> specified more
> Linux kernel v. 2.6.23 had 256 loop devices
> Linux kernel v. 2.6.24 and later does not have these limitations

The device files still have to exist in the filesystem though. (That's a 
fairly bizare concept in itself...)

>> 2. before you can mount anything loopback, you have to determine which 
>> device numbers (if any) are free.
> 
> Just try this:
> 
>   mount -o loop,offset=somenumberofbytes ~/sda.img /mnt/sda1
> 
>  From the mount manual:

> is given), then mount will try to find some unused loop device and use 
> that."

So somebody wrote the code to automatically select a free device. The 
fact is, you still need there to be a free device. I still don't get why 
you can't just mount the file itself...

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