Re: [Bug-ddrescue] Warning idea.

[Antonio Diaz Diaz]

Hello Andrew,

andrew zajac wrote:
> I think a lot of people who are new to Gnu/Linux run it to use Gnu
> ddrescue.  It seems to me that they often make a particular mistake. 
> That is to confuse a destination partition with the filesystem on
> that partition.

I think you are right.


> I suggest that when Gnu ddrescue is asked to write directly to a
> device such as a partition, it prompt the user with a warning that
> all existing data on the destination drive will be lost.  If the
> destination is a file, no such warning is given.

I have until now resisted suggestions about prompts, warnings, forcing 
logfile usage, etc, because I see ddrescue mainly as a specialized dd 
for users who know what they are doing.

But given how different ddrescue has become from dd, and how many 
unexperienced users are using ddrescue to wipe their external drives, 
perhaps it is time to implement a '--force' option as well as all kind 
of safety measures if it is not specified.

I agree with you that asking for confirmation when writing directly to 
any non-regular file should be one of those safety measures.


> Perhaps, too, sizes can be checked to see if sufficient space is
> available on either the filesystem in the case of an image file, or
> the destination partition/device is big enough to fit the source
> device?

This will be more difficult. On some systems ddrescue is unable even to 
find out the size of the input device.


> Best regards from a huge Gnu ddrescue fan,

Thanks. I greatly appreciate your suggestions and your help messages in 
this list.


Best regards,
Antonio.