Orchid XP v8 wrote:
> I still miss the old days when you could take a filesystem offline to 
> defrag it properly... :-(

You mean, back in DOS days, when you couldn't run anything but the defrag 
tool while the machine's running? :-)  What's "improper" about the 
defragging it does now?

-- 
   Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
   Why is there a chainsaw in DOOM?
   There aren't any trees on Mars.

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Darren New wrote:
> 
> You mean, back in DOS days, when you couldn't run anything but the
> defrag tool while the machine's running? :-)  What's "improper" about
> the defragging it does now?
> 

You can't stop users from doing work and look as important anymore? :P

-Aero

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>> I still miss the old days when you could take a filesystem offline to 
>> defrag it properly... :-(
> 
> You mean, back in DOS days, when you couldn't run anything but the 
> defrag tool while the machine's running? :-)  What's "improper" about 
> the defragging it does now?

People can be refragmenting the files as you're trying to defrag them?

(Also this is presumably why every defrag tool known to man fails to 
defrag certain parts of the filesystem.)

-- 
http://blog.orphi.me.uk/
http://www.zazzle.com/MathematicalOrchid*

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Orchid XP v8 wrote:
> People can be refragmenting the files as you're trying to defrag them?

Most defragmenters either lock the file while it's being defragged or they 
stop defragging if you open the file for writing while they're defragging it.

> (Also this is presumably why every defrag tool known to man fails to 
> defrag certain parts of the filesystem.)

That's more because bits of the kernel keep physical locations of files in 
memory (like swap, or root directory, or whatever).  Also, if you have the 
file open for writing (like the registry, say), then it's rough to defrag 
while it's being written.  Which is why (for example) the "page file 
defragmenter" runs during boot rather than live.

-- 
   Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
   Why is there a chainsaw in DOOM?
   There aren't any trees on Mars.

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>> (Also this is presumably why every defrag tool known to man fails to 
>> defrag certain parts of the filesystem.)
> 
> That's more because bits of the kernel keep physical locations of files 
> in memory (like swap, or root directory, or whatever).  Also, if you 
> have the file open for writing (like the registry, say), then it's rough 
> to defrag while it's being written.  Which is why (for example) the 
> "page file defragmenter" runs during boot rather than live.

Indeed. If you could run a defragger with the filesystem unmounted, you 
could move around anything you like.

Still, Windows doesn't seem to support the concept of mounting and 
unmounting filesystems at will...

-- 
http://blog.orphi.me.uk/
http://www.zazzle.com/MathematicalOrchid*

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Orchid XP v8 wrote:
> Indeed. If you could run a defragger with the filesystem unmounted, you 
> could move around anything you like.

With suffient information about what is where, everything but hardcoded 
blocks could be moved around, yes.

> Still, Windows doesn't seem to support the concept of mounting and 
> unmounting filesystems at will...

Of course it does.  There are just some file systems you can't unmount 
because the kernel is using files there.

-- 
   Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
   Why is there a chainsaw in DOOM?
   There aren't any trees on Mars.

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Darren New wrote:

>> Still, Windows doesn't seem to support the concept of mounting and 
>> unmounting filesystems at will...
> 
> Of course it does.  There are just some file systems you can't unmount 
> because the kernel is using files there.

Well you can't unmount the second partition on your harddrive, defrag 
it, and then remount it (for example).

Of course, under Linux you can mount and unmount things at will - you 
just can't defrag anything at all! :-}

-- 
http://blog.orphi.me.uk/
http://www.zazzle.com/MathematicalOrchid*

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Orchid XP v8 wrote:
> Well you can't unmount the second partition on your harddrive, defrag 
> it, and then remount it (for example).

Sure you can. You have to write your own defrag tool, but you can certainly 
unmount the second partition, do raw I/O to it, and then remount it[1]. If 
you had a defrag tool that would work on an unmounted partition, you could 
do this. The one that is built into Windows assumes you want your system 
live while doing this, so it deals with it, handling the fact that you're 
moving the file transparently to the users.

> Of course, under Linux you can mount and unmount things at will

No you can't. You can't unmount a file system with open files on it under 
Linux either.  You can defrag it (or fsck it) while it's mounted, but 
that'll just corrupt it, most likely.



[1] For example, try "chkdsk d: /x" from an administrator command line.

-- 
   Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
   Why is there a chainsaw in DOOM?
   There aren't any trees on Mars.

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>> Yeah, I was talking about *algebraic* data type when I said "all 
>> Haskell types are ADTs". ;-)
> 
> Sorry. I get them mixed up, since the definitions changed since I 
> studied them.
> 
>> I think we're still talking about two different meanings of ADT. ;-)
> 
> Possibly.

So, now do you agree that "all Haskell types are algebraic data types"? ;-)

-- 
http://blog.orphi.me.uk/
http://www.zazzle.com/MathematicalOrchid*

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Orchid XP v8 wrote:
> So, now do you agree that "all Haskell types are algebraic data types"? ;-)

I don't know. I'm thinking not, but perhaps so. I don't know the details of 
Haskell well enough, but it's possible, yes.

-- 
   Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
   "Ouch ouch ouch!"
   "What's wrong? Noodles too hot?"
   "No, I have Chopstick Tunnel Syndrome."

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