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The Ubuntu community has contributed 10324 ideas, 46361 comments, 1015854 votes

Idea #323: Disk Manager by default



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Written by frandavid100 the 29 Feb 08 at 00:37. Category: Installation.
Related to: Nothing/Others. Status: New
Description
There have been complaints that Ubuntu lacks a disk configuration utility, which forces newbies to manually edit fstab if they want to use a drive that was not present when they installed the system. Manually editing the file is difficult and frustrating to them, and not an ideal way to handle the issue on the long run.

An application exists by the name of Disk Manager, which keeps tracks and notifies of newly added units, and for extremely easy (automagical) configuration. That is the kind of stuff we want in Ubuntu.

-Disk Manager notifies about new drives:

http://flomertens.free.fr/disk-manager/images/notify.png

-Disk Manager allows the user to mount or unmount drives without any hassle, even by providing a simple name for them:

http://flomertens.free.fr/disk-manager/images/add.png

-Disk Manager allows to easily enable NTFS writing support:

http://flomertens.free.fr/disk-manager/images/main_general.png

-Disk Manager allows to keep track of mounted / unmounted partitions and free space on them:

http://flomertens.free.fr/disk-manager/images/main_advance.png
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KawF wrote on the 29 Feb 08 at 11:09
Disk Manager looks like a great addition to Ubuntu, and something I've been missing for quite some time.

alloneword wrote on the 29 Feb 08 at 11:20
There are a few items on this theme. The inclusion of DM or Gparted in a default install would be a grat improvement.

SeySayux wrote on the 29 Feb 08 at 12:14
How about: not editing fstab?
http://brainstorm.ubuntu.com/idea/183/

bigdufstuff wrote on the 29 Feb 08 at 13:37
This is something that should just work, and shouldn't need configuring. I voted NO, because I don't think the solution is to throw in yet another cofiguration utility.

BungaMan wrote on the 29 Feb 08 at 21:01
You may want to have a utility in case the "just work" doesn't just work...

frandavid100 wrote on the 1 Mar 08 at 07:23
There are cases where you might change these things manually. For example, I have two different partitions for different versions of Ubuntu. When I launch one, I would like the other not to appear.

DeveloperDeveloper RainCT (Ubuntu Developer) wrote on the 1 Mar 08 at 12:49
AFAIK Disk Manager is already in Hardy.

frandavid100 wrote on the 3 Mar 08 at 22:09
No, it's not.

benjavalero wrote on the 4 Mar 08 at 15:36
Mmm, I also think that this kind of problems should be solved automatically without needing to configure anything. For example, if the partition table has changed.

dedesite wrote on the 4 Mar 08 at 21:22
Great Idea, it would help a lot of people!!!

Marlo_nl wrote on the 11 Mar 08 at 19:04
I fully agree that Ubuntu needs a tool, be it GUI, automatic or both, that will assist users to keep the information stored in fstab in line with the actual HDD partitioning.

Especially on multi-boot systems where changes to HDD partitions and/or adding additional HDDs can be done outside the Ubuntu OS it should be possible to "sync" the fstab information using other means than a terminal and text editor.

I consider the lack of "intelligent" fstab management a missing (fundamental) feature of the Ubuntu OS.

Regards, Marlo

gnarlin wrote on the 20 Mar 08 at 18:10
Also, at what point do you actually have to get your hands dirty and be force to, you know, learn something!
If you assume that all users are idiots and then you design a system for idiots only idiots will be willing to use it.

DanRabbit wrote on the 23 Mar 08 at 17:27
I love this idea! I went and downloaded the utility right away so I could configure my new slave!

Endolith wrote on the 2 May 08 at 14:59
"Also, at what point do you actually have to get your hands dirty and be force to, you know, learn something!
If you assume that all users are idiots and then you design a system for idiots only idiots will be willing to use it."

Please find a different distro to use and contribute your ideas there. Ubuntu is for real people who want to USE their computers to accomplish useful tasks. They expect system-level details to be handled automatically, as they should be. There are plenty of other distros for people who want to dig around in the guts of their computers, learn how to program, etc. You'd probably enjoy one of those.

Endolith wrote on the 2 May 08 at 17:39
fstab editing utilities:

http://flomertens.free.fr/disk-manager/

http://pysdm.sourceforge.net/

http://www.diffingo.com/content/view/32/47/lang,en/

http://kfstab.sourceforge.net/

drinkypoo wrote on the 8 May 08 at 15:19
gotta love the screenshots with misspellings/typos in them :)

Seems like this thing is just an fdisk editor with gnome-style notifications. Why use this one as opposed to any other option? (I'm downloading it now, so I can see for myself, perhaps.)

NTFS write is easy - install ntfs-3g, and you're done. It disables the read-only ntfs support on install. The install could be done with a checkbox in Add/Remove. Keeping track of disk space is provided by a wealth of utilities; I use gkrellm on a regular basis, but the gnome system monitor does this and there are gnome applets that do it, too.

One last note; removing the fstab file is a very bad idea. There is no need whatsoever to use the fstab for all filesystems, but there is nothing wrong with it as a place to store filesystem options. I could see the merit in having a per-user fstab, which would be checked by the automounter if you are logged into the console when you plug a device into the host, or if you are logged into a remote host, then when you connect a network block device. These files would not be used at boot and so would not conflict with the system; just give a config option for which file wins in the case of a conflict (you could even have a filesystem option to override which file wins, ala the CSS !important directive.)

DeveloperDeveloper amaranth (Ubuntu Developer) wrote on the 12 May 08 at 05:53
We used to have a Disk Manager (from GNOME) but it had security problems so it was removed (I think). However, there is work being done in this area and we will hopefully see something from it for intrepid.

http://people.freedesktop.org/~david/gdu-smart-and-failing.png

andersja wrote on the 14 May 08 at 11:42
@amaranth - that screenshot looks cool. I still really like the "automagic" notifications in the Disk Manager screenshots in frandavid100's posting above. Perhaps the existing code can be made secure & patches submitted upstream (if security really was the issue? )

uaneme wrote on the 14 Jun 08 at 06:14
this diskmanager looks fab though many of it should be added to gparted (setting the mountpoint for instance)

+1 for better disk management



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