1.\" Copyright (C) 1993, 1994, 1995, 2001 by Joerg Wunsch, Dresden 2.\" All rights reserved. 3.\" 4.\" Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without 5.\" modification, are permitted provided that the following conditions 6.\" are met: 7.\" 1. Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright 8.\" notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer. 9.\" 2. Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above copyright 10.\" notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer in the 11.\" documentation and/or other materials provided with the distribution. 12.\" 13.\" THIS SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED BY THE AUTHOR(S) ``AS IS'' AND ANY EXPRESS 14.\" OR IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE IMPLIED 15.\" WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE ARE 16.\" DISCLAIMED. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE AUTHOR(S) BE LIABLE FOR ANY DIRECT, 17.\" INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES 18.\" (INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, PROCUREMENT OF SUBSTITUTE GOODS OR 19.\" SERVICES; LOSS OF USE, DATA, OR PROFITS; OR BUSINESS INTERRUPTION) 20.\" HOWEVER CAUSED AND ON ANY THEORY OF LIABILITY, WHETHER IN CONTRACT, 21.\" STRICT LIABILITY, OR TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE OR OTHERWISE) ARISING 22.\" IN ANY WAY OUT OF THE USE OF THIS SOFTWARE, EVEN IF ADVISED OF THE 23.\" POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGE. 24.\" 25.Dd May 23, 2020 26.Dt FDFORMAT 8 27.Os 28.Sh NAME 29.Nm fdformat 30.Nd format floppy disks 31.Sh SYNOPSIS 32.Nm 33.Op Fl F Ar fill 34.Op Fl f Ar fmt 35.Op Fl s Ar fmtstr 36.Op Fl nqvy 37.Ar device 38.Sh DESCRIPTION 39The 40.Nm 41utility formats a floppy disk at 42.Ar device , 43where 44.Ar device 45may either be given as a full path 46name of a device node for a floppy disk drive 47(e.g.,\& 48.Pa /dev/fd0 ) , 49or using an abbreviated name that will be looked up 50under 51.Pa /dev 52(e.g.,\& 53.Dq Li fd0 ) . 54.Pp 55The options are as follows: 56.Bl -tag -width ".Fl s Ar fmtstr" 57.It Fl F Ar fill 58Use 59.Ar fill 60as the fill byte for newly formatted sectors. 61The 62.Ar fill 63argument 64must be a number in the range 0 through 255 using common C 65language notation. 66The default value is 67.Dq Li 0xf6 . 68.It Fl f Ar fmt 69Specify the density settings for a 70.Ar fmt 71kilobyte format, as described in 72.Xr fdcontrol 8 . 73.It Fl s Ar fmtstr 74Specify the density settings using explicit parameters, as 75described in 76.Xr fdcontrol 8 . 77.It Fl n 78Do not verify floppy after formatting. 79.It Fl q 80Suppress any normal output from the command, and do not ask the 81user for a confirmation whether to format the floppy disk at 82.Ar device . 83.It Fl v 84Do not format, verify only. 85.It Fl y 86Do not ask for confirmation whether to format the floppy disk but 87still report formatting status. 88.El 89.Pp 90For non-autoselecting subdevices, neither 91.Fl f Ar fmt 92nor 93.Fl s Ar fmtstr 94may be specified, since the preconfigured media density settings 95from the kernel driver will always be used. 96However, if 97.Ar device 98is a device with automatic media density selection (see 99.Xr fdc 4 ) , 100both methods can be used to override the density settings for the 101newly formatted medium (without permanently changing the density 102settings of 103.Ar device ) . 104.Pp 105If the 106.Fl q 107flag has not been specified, the user is asked for a confirmation 108of the intended formatting process. 109In order to continue, an answer 110of 111.Ql y 112must be given. 113.Pp 114Note that 115.Nm 116does only perform low-level formatting. 117In order to create 118a file system on the medium, see the commands 119.Xr newfs 8 120for a 121.Tn UFS 122file system, or 123.Xr newfs_msdos 8 124for an 125.Tn MS-DOS 126(FAT) 127file system. 128.Sh EXIT STATUS 129An exit status of 0 is returned upon successful operation. 130Exit status 1311 is returned on any errors during floppy formatting, and an exit status 132of 2 reflects invalid arguments given to the program (along with an 133appropriate information written to diagnostic output). 134.Sh EXAMPLES 135To format a new double-sided, high-density (HD) 1.44 MB disk 136inserted in the first floppy disk drive, issue: 137.Pp 138.Dl "/usr/sbin/fdformat -f 1440 /dev/fd0" 139.Pp 140After low-level formatting the disk with 141.Nm , 142create a disk label so that the system can determine the size and 143geometry of the disk. 144The supported geometry values are listed in 145.Pa /etc/disktab , 146and we will use 147.Va fd1440 148for this example. 149To write the disk label, use 150.Xr bsdlabel 8 : 151.Pp 152.Dl "/sbin/bsdlabel -B -w /dev/fd0 fd1440" 153.Pp 154The floppy is now ready to be high-level formatted with a file system. 155To format the floppy disk with FAT, issue: 156.Pp 157.Dl "/sbin/newfs_msdos /dev/fd0" 158.Sh DIAGNOSTICS 159Unless 160.Fl q 161has been specified, a single letter is printed to standard output 162to inform the user about the progress of work. 163First, an 164.Ql F 165is printed when the track is being formatted, then a 166.Ql V 167while it is being verified, and if an error has been detected, it 168will finally change to 169.Ql E . 170Detailed status information (cylinder, head and sector number, and the 171exact cause of the error) will be printed for up to 10 errors after the 172entire formatting process has completed. 173.Sh SEE ALSO 174.Xr fdc 4 , 175.Xr bsdlabel 8 , 176.Xr fdcontrol 8 , 177.Xr newfs 8 , 178.Xr newfs_msdos 8 179.Sh HISTORY 180The 181.Nm 182utility 183has been developed for 184.Bx 386 0.1 185and upgraded to the new 186.Xr fdc 4 187floppy disk driver. 188It later became part of the 189.Fx 1.1 190system. 191Starting with 192.Fx 5.0 , 193it uses the unified density specifications as described in 194.Xr fdcontrol 8 . 195.Sh AUTHORS 196.An -nosplit 197The program has been contributed by 198.An J\(:org Wunsch , 199Dresden, with changes by 200.An Serge Vakulenko 201and 202.An Andrey A. Chernov , 203Moscow. 204