NAME¶

dasdview - Display DASD and VTOC information and dump the content of a DASD to the console.

SYNOPSIS¶

dasdview [-h] [-v]
[-b begin] [-s size] [-1|-2]
[-i] [-x] [-j] [-c]
[-l] [-t { info|f1|f4|f5|f7|f8|f9}]
{-n devno|-f node} device

DESCRIPTION¶

dasdview prints you some useful information of your disks to the console. You can display a disk dump by specifying start point and offset and you can print the volume label and VTOC entries. The device is the node of the device (e.g. '/dev/dasda'). Any device node created by udev for kernel 2.6 can be used (e.g. '/dev/dasd/0.0.b100/disc').

OPTIONS¶

-h or --help

Print usage and exit.

 

-v or --version

Print version number and exit.

 

-b begin or --begin=begin

Print a disk dump to the console, starting with begin. The content of the disk will be displayed in hexadecimal numbers, ASCII text and EBCDIC text. If no size is specified dasdview will take the default size. The variable begin can be specified in one of the following ways:

 

 

begin[k|m|b|t|c]

 

 

The default for begin is 0.

 

 

Note: dasdview will show you the content of your disk using the DASD driver. If this driver decides to hide or add some parts of the disk, you have to live with it. This happens for example with the first two tracks of a cdl-formatted disk. In this case the DASD driver fills up shorter blocks with zeros to have a constant blocksize. And all applications, including dasdview, believe it.

 

 

examples:

 

-b 32 --> start printing at Byte 32

 

-b 32k --> start printing at kByte 32

 

-b 32m --> start printing at MByte 32

 

-b 32b --> start printing at block 32

 

-b 32t --> start printing at track 32

 

-b 32c --> start printing at cylinder 32

 

-s size or --size=size

Print a disk dump to the console, starting with begin, specified with the -b option and size size. The content of the disk will be displayed in hexadecimal numbers, ASCII text and EBCDIC text. If no start value is specified dasdview will take the default start value. The variable size can be specified in one of the following ways:

 

 

size[k|m|b|t|c]

 

 

The default for size is 128.

 

 

examples:

 

-s 16 --> use a 16 Byte size

 

-s 16k --> use a 16 kByte size

 

-s 16m --> use a 16 MByte size

 

-s 16b --> use a 16 block size

 

-s 16t --> use a 16 track size

 

-s 16c --> use a 16 cylinder size

 

-1

This option tells dasdview to print the disk dump using format 1. This means you will get 16 Bytes per line in hex, ascii and ebcdic. There is no line number.

 

The -1 option makes only sense with the -b and/or the -s options.

 

This is the default.

 

-2

This option tells dasdview to print the disk dump using format 2. This means you will get 8 Bytes per line in hex, ascii and ebcdic. And in addition a line number and a decimal and hexadecimal byte count will be printed.

 

The -2 option makes only sense with the -b and/or the -s options.

 

-i or --info

Print some useful information (e.g. device node/number/type or geometry data). When running dasdview on a kernel 2.6 based distribution the busid is printed instead of the device number.

 

-x or --extended

Print some more DASD information (e.g. open count, subchannel identifier).

 

-j or --volser

Print volume serial number (volume identifier).

 

-l or --label

Print the volume label.

 

-c or --characteristic

Print some information about the device e.g. if it is encrypted.

 

-t spec or --vtoc=spec

Print the VTOC (table of content) or single VTOC entries to the console. spec can be one of the following strings:

 

 

info:

 

Gives you a VTOC overview. You will see what other S/390 or zSeries operating systems would see (e.g. data set names and sizes).

 

 

f1:

 

Print the content of all format 1 DSCBs.

 

 

f4:

 

Print the content of the format 4 DSCB.

 

 

f5:

 

Print the content of the format 5 DSCB.

 

 

f7:

 

Print the content of the format 7 DSCB.

 

 

f8:

 

Print the content of all format 8 DSCBs.

 

 

f9:

 

Print the content of all format 9 DSCBs.

 

 

all:

 

Print the content of all DSCBs.

 

-n devno or --devno=devno

Specify the device using the device number devno. This option is only usable if you system has switched on the device file system.

 

 

NOTE: This option is now deprecated. Use the required parameter device instead.

 

 

example:

 

You want to display information about your DASD with hexadecimal device number 193. Then you could use the following command:

 

 

dasdview -i -n 193

 

-f node or --devnode=node

Specify the device using the device node devnode. This option can also be used in case you don't use the device file system.

 

 

NOTE: This option is now deprecated. Use the required parameter device instead.

 

 

example:

 

You want to display information about your DASD with device node /dev/dasda or /dev/dasd/0193/device. Then you could use the following commands:

 

 

dasdview -i -f /dev/dasda

 

or

 

dasdview -i -f /dev/dasd/0193/device