DFMT(8,C) AIX Commands Reference DFMT(8,C) ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- dfmt PURPOSE Writes a label, a vtoc and a boot block on a 370 disk. SYNTAX +------ - ------+ dfmt ---| +-----------+ |--- special label ---| +-| -C -bfile |-+ ^| -d -O || || -D -R || || -F -vfile || || -S || || -l || |+-----------+| +-------------+ DESCRIPTION The dfmt command is a 370-specific program used in installation to write a label, vtoc, and a boot block on a 370 disk. By default, dfmt writes a label, an empty boot block, and empty vtoc, and a boot record that goes into a wait state. CKD disks must be formatted with a 4K block size using the CMS format command. The dfmt command does not format disks at the hardware level. FLAGS -d Print progress reports while running. -D Only print progress reports, do not write to disk. -C Simulate a ckd disk on a normal file. -F Simulate a fba disk on a normal file. -S Assume default answers on all questions. -l Rewrite the label. -bfile Install a new boot block from file. -R Reformat the entire disk. Warning: The -R option reformats the entire disk and erases all Processed December 5, 1991 DFMT(8,C) 1 DFMT(8,C) AIX Commands Reference DFMT(8,C) previous MBR and VTOC information. This option should only be used on new or scratch VM minidisks. Because dfmt -R erases the record of previous minidisk and dumpcfg commands, this option should not be used in cases where you wish to retain the results of previous dumpcfg or minidisk operations. -vfile Write a new vtoc described by file. file may be specified a "-" to standard input. file contains lines of the following format: ID_number startblk endblk Use a negative ID_number to specify a boot partition. Processed December 5, 1991 DFMT(8,C) 2