Re: Extended Linux partition

David Holland (dholland@hcs.harvard.edu)
Thu, 5 Oct 1995 13:38:30 -0400 (EDT)

> Albert Cahalan wrote:
> > Or not so trivial: use 64-bit linear sector numbers in
> > a fixed table with room for 16+ partitions.
>
> Good, although 32 bits should be enough for next 10 years or so (max disk
> size: 2 terabytes). Room for more partitions would be good thing.

Rather than fixing the size, use one of the first few bytes to
indicate how wide the sector numbers are. Since you only need to
remember the log base 2 of the size, a single byte can make it
possible to deal with up to 2^255 bits, or quite a bit more sectors
than anybody is likely to ever need.

32 would probably be fine for now. (Why hasn't Microsoft ever come out
with a 32-bit FAT filesystem? They still have 16-bit cluster numbers,
which is why the cluster sizes are so huge.)

-- 
   - David A. Holland             | Average number of times an American 
     dholland@hcs.harvard.edu     | opens the refrigerator each day: 22