1NTFSPROGS(8) System Manager's Manual NTFSPROGS(8)
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6 libntfs-gnomevfs - Module for GNOME VFS that allows access to NTFS
7 filesystems.
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10 The GNOME virtual filesystem (VFS) provides universal access to differ‐
11 ent filesystems. The libntfs-gnomevfs module enables GNOME VFS aware
12 clients to seamlessly utilize the NTFS library libntfs.
13 So you can access an NTFS filesystem without needing to use the NTFS
15 utilities themselves (at least in theory anyway). In practice this is
16 probably more useful for programs and programmers to make using libntfs
17 easier, more generic, and to allow easier debugging of libntfs.
18
21 Prerequisites
22 To be able to follow these examples you will need to have installed the
23 test utilities from the gnome-vfs-2.4.x package. The easiest way to do
24 this is to download and compile the gnome-vfs-2 package, e.g. download
25 from:
26 http://ftp.gnome.org/pub/GNOME/desktop/2.4/2.4.0/sources/gnome-
28 vfs-2.4.0.tar.gz
29 Then run ./configure followed by make and make install (as root). This
31 will install it into /usr/local so it should not conflict with your
32 existing installation from rpm or deb packages which will be in /usr.
33 Note you may also need to add /usr/local/lib to /etc/ld.so.conf and
35 then run ldconfig (as root) to let your system see the installed gnome-
36 vfs-2.4.x libraries.
37 Then run ./configure followed by make and make install (as root) in the
39 main ntfsprogs directory to build and install the libntfs-gnomevfs mod‐
40 ule and libntfs library which is used by the module.
41 Copying a file from an NTFS partition
44 To copy the file autoexec.bat from the main directory of an NTFS parti‐
45 tion (/dev/hda1) to the /tmp directory on your system you could run:
46 /path/to/gnome-vfs-2.4.x/test/test-xfer file:///dev/hda1#lib‐
48 ntfs:/autoexec.bat /tmp/autoexec.bat
49 To copy a file from a directory inside the NTFS partition you would
51 just specify the full path. So for example to copy the file win.ini
52 from the Windows directory you would run:
53 /path/to/gnome-vfs-2.4.x/test/test-xfer file:///dev/hda1#libntfs:/Win‐
55 dows/win.ini /tmp/win.ini
56 Shell access to an NTFS partition
59 For debugging it is most useful to be able to do various things to the
60 NTFS partition while it is being operated upon by libntfs. This is
61 achieved using the test-shell utility (from the gnome-vfs-2.4.x pack‐
62 age) by running: /path/to/gnome-vfs-2.4.x/test/test-shell
63 This drops you into the GNOME VFS shell from where you can now cd into
65 the NTFS partition (/dev/hda1) by typing: cd file:///dev/hda1#libntfs:/
66 You are now in the root directory of the NTFS partition. The first
68 thing you will probably want to do is to type "ls" to display the
69 directory contents.
70 You could then change directories using the "cd" command, e.g. to enter
72 the Windows directory you would type: cd Windows
73 You can then open files, seek inside files, read from files (write is
75 not enabled at present), etc thus exercising large portions of the NTFS
76 library.
77 Use the "help" command while in the shell to see the available com‐
79 mands.
80
83 No bugs are known but there are several limitations at the moment:
84 You cannot get information about files other than what the "ls" command
86 in the test-shell can give you, i.e. the "info" command in the test-
87 shell does not work.
88 Further access to the partition is read-only and hence you cannot write
90 to files. This will be changed in the future once the module has had
91 more wide testing.
92 There may be other limitations and possibly bugs. Please report any
94 problems to the NTFS mailing list: linux-ntfs-dev@lists.sourceforge.net
95
98 The libntfs-gnomevfs module was written by Jan Kratochvil. This man
99 page was written by Anton Altaparmakov.
100
103 The ntfsprogs package which contains the libntfs-gnomevfs module can be
104 downloaded from http://www.linux-ntfs.org/content/view/19/37/ These
105 manual pages can be viewed online at http://man.linux-ntfs.org/ntf‐
106 sprogs.8.html
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110 ntfsprogs(8)
111Linux-NTFS version 2.0.0 November 2003 NTFSPROGS(8)