ChkDskX history (version issue), sources?

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Torsten
Posts: 8
Joined: Wed Feb 21, 2018 10:26 am

ChkDskX history (version issue), sources?

Post by Torsten »

Hello Development Forum,

when testing ReactOS v0.4.4, I was surprised to see ChkDskX v1.0.1 by
Emanuele Aliberti, based on sources by Mark Russinovich, as the system's
default CHKDSK program. All the more because I hadn't seen any code of
Russinovich's freeware tools, I didn't know that he ever published any.

Similar to CHKFAT32 (part of the FAT324NT driver package by Russinovich),
ChkDskX v1.0.1 seems to operate in read-only mode only, as AUTOCHK/ CHKDSK
were unable to fix FAT32 file system errors in ReactOS 0.4.4 (had to run
SCANDISK from DOS, instead).

At least, ChkDskX v1.0.1 doesn't crash when checking large FAT32 volumes,
as is the case with the original CHKFAT32 v1.06. This makes the latter
completely useless, when run under Windows NT 4.0. Alas, the ChkDskX
build in ReactOS v0.4.4 won't operate in WinNT4 (does nothing).

Are there ChkDskX builds in earlier ReactOS releases, when compatibility
with WinNT4 was still the focus, which may operate under that system?
Information about ChkDskX' version history and/ or sources also welcome.

I hope the topic is suitable for this subforum. CHKDSK or Emanuele
Aliberti are rarely mentioned in other ones, anyway.

Regards, Torsten
hbelusca
Developer
Posts: 1204
Joined: Sat Dec 26, 2009 10:36 pm
Location: Zagreb, Croatia

Re: ChkDskX history (version issue), sources?

Post by hbelusca »

The source of chkdsk from sysinternals was long time ago available before sysintenals was absorbed by Microsoft:
http://pete.akeo.ie/2012/04/chkdskx-and ... ovich.html
https://web.archive.org/web/20060821123 ... fmifs.html
Torsten
Posts: 8
Joined: Wed Feb 21, 2018 10:26 am

Re: ChkDskX history (version issue), sources?

Post by Torsten »

Thanks for the links, HBelusca

the information contained therein is enlightening!
(Russinovich's explanation on the DLL chain loaded
by CHKDSK and FORMAT).

However bad news for Windows NT 4.0: as the command line
tools are rather frontends for FMIFS.DLL and dependencies,
which are continuously improved for ReactOS, their sources
are unavailable for the MS system.

But the mentioned, buggy CHKFAT32 utility chooses a different
approach, anyway: it doesn't rely on file system DLLs (there
is no UFAT32.DLL in the driver package), but seems to do all
checking alone. And it's sources aren't available, neither.

Chkdskx can't do the job, by design, i.e. does not work around
CHKFAT32's inability to check large drivers. Russinovich's
tools are great, but not perfect. Know them better now!
For, e.g. NTFSDOS or NTFSCHK, he used to create a virtual
environments for Windows file system DLLs, for operating on
such drives. While he never created a FAT32CHK (for checking
these drives from operating systems without native support),
NTFSCHK could be a (preliminary) option for ReactOS.

Torsten
erkinalp
Posts: 861
Joined: Sat Dec 20, 2008 5:55 pm
Location: Izmir, TR

Re: ChkDskX history (version issue), sources?

Post by erkinalp »

But the mentioned, buggy CHKFAT32 utility chooses a different
approach, anyway: it doesn't rely on file system DLLs (there
is no UFAT32.DLL in the driver package), but seems to do all
checking alone. And it's sources aren't available, neither.
I did not know UFAT.DLL did not support FAT32 variant.
-uses Ubuntu+GNOME 3 GNU/Linux
-likes Free (as in freedom) and Open Source Detergents
-favors open source of Windows 10 under GPL2
hbelusca
Developer
Posts: 1204
Joined: Sat Dec 26, 2009 10:36 pm
Location: Zagreb, Croatia

Re: ChkDskX history (version issue), sources?

Post by hbelusca »

erkinalp wrote:
But the mentioned, buggy CHKFAT32 utility chooses a different
approach, anyway: it doesn't rely on file system DLLs (there
is no UFAT32.DLL in the driver package), but seems to do all
checking alone. And it's sources aren't available, neither.
I did not know UFAT.DLL did not support FAT32 variant.
LOL of course it does support FAT32! Where did you read that? UFAT (and fastfat.sys for that matter) supports FAT12, FAT16 and FAT32.
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