Re: Diskless export/import - here's a method to do so

Chuck <chuckh_nospam_at_softhome.net> wrote in message news:<Xns948B7B2D5AD39chuckhsofthomenet_at_130.133.1.17>...
> Stephan Bressler <sbresslerx_no_spam_at_arcor.de> wrote in
> news:bvvfbk$3ja$1_at_news.mch.sbs.de:
>

...
> > Hi,
> > you could even run it without mknod from the source system (or
> > target): exp xxx/xxx file=/dev/fd/1 volsize=0 | ssh target ".
> > _setup_env_script; imp yyy/yyy /dev/fd/0"
> >
> > /dev/fd/* are alias to a process' file descriptors, 0=STDIN, 1=STDOUT,
> > etc.
> >
> > I usually use this feature to transfer whole directory trees to other
> > systems using tar.
> >
> > Stephan
> >
>
> Doesn't work on AIX 4.3 with sh or ksh. In fact the only os/shell
> combination I've gotten it to work on is cygwin/bash. Is that a
> requirement or am I doing something wrong?

It works because "bash handles several filenames specially when they are used in redirections" (from bash man page) and /dev/fd is one of those names. My understanding is fdesc filesystem exists in Linux and BSD but is not implemented in major proprietary Unixes (e.g. HP-UX). I might be wrong though.

Regards,
Igor Received on Wed Feb 11 2004 - 18:35:25 CST