Mac + Adobe + Fat32 + Users = Bad Idea

CS4 Pro Adobe DMG Image is nearly 5 gigabytes.

Macs can't write NTFS drives, so you have to format in FAT32 (Mac OS Journaled FS is not feasible)...but FAT32 only supports files up to 2 gigabytes. So I go find a spare USB drive.

Well his bloated adobe CS4 installer is 5 gigabytes - a single DMG file, and there's no way to break it apart or zip it up in to multiple files in mac OS...and he won't install any third-party software.

So here i am burning this on a dual-layer dvd...crossing my fingers...and then i discover his macbook air DOESNT HAVE A DVD DRIVE. Go track down more USB equipment.

This guy won't let me install it from a network share because he doesn't trust the network shares -- even the shares on his XServe because he doesn't think software can go on a network, only data (even though I am "secretly" using a network share to copy this thing).

Ahhh. Could this be a bigger nightmare? This isnt even my job.

Find more posts tagged with

Free for TechExams community: Cybersecurity salary guide

Compare cert salaries and plan your next career move

Button

Comments

dynamik

I think that equation will always end the same whenever you add users into the mix. It's like multiplying by 0. It doesn't matter what preceded it, as soon as you multiply by 0, the answer will always be 0

Why can't you use the native OSX file system? I'd just tell him because of file-size limitations, you have to install it over a network share, take it or leave it.

hypnotoad

dynamik wrote: »

I think that equation will always end the same whenever you add users into the mix. It's like multiplying by 0. It doesn't matter what preceded it, as soon as you multiply by 0, the answer will always be 0

Why can't you use the native OSX file system? I'd just tell him because of file-size limitations, you have to install it over a network share, take it or leave it.

Yeah I should have just reformatted his drive in Mac format

Then of course I would loose interoperability with his PC...and I didn't feel like backing all that stuff up...because he also doesn't trust Virtual Machines -- so it would have to go back to Fat32 eventually.

You're right man, if I could take the users out of the mix, this would be easy. Ha.

Any unix gurus know WHY for the love of god *nix has such an issue with NTFS?

msteinhilber

hypnotoad wrote: »

...and he won't install any third-party software....

...

This guy won't let me install it from a network share because he doesn't trust the network shares -- even the shares on his XServe because he doesn't think software can go on a network, only data (even though I am "secretly" using a network share to copy this thing).

Ahhh. Could this be a bigger nightmare? This isnt even my job.

Does he have his desk and workstation sitting inside a faraday cage as well? Jeez...

tiersten

If it is just to install Photochop then the Mac not being able to write to a NTFS formatted USB drive wouldn't be a problem would it? Format as NTFS, copy massive DMG on, plug into MBA and install. Thats assuming the DMG is on a PC. If its on another Mac then I can see your fun

Anything which isn't Windows has some kind of issue with NTFS because Microsoft basically refuse to document it. Linux support for NTFS has gotten pretty good now but it is still a mostly a reverse engineered effort. Reading is pretty safe but writing can cause massive corruption due to the manifest not being updated properly.

You could split it up using dd and then combine it again on the other end using just cat tho. Both should be present on every OSX install.

petedude

tiersten wrote: »

. . .
Anything which isn't Windows has some kind of issue with NTFS because Microsoft basically refuse to document it. Linux support for NTFS has gotten pretty good now but it is still a mostly a reverse engineered effort. Reading is pretty safe but writing can cause massive corruption due to the manifest not being updated properly.
. . .

Given time, effort and enough user nagging, I'm sure Apple will eventually fix it.

Solaris_UNIX

hypnotoad wrote: »

CS4 Pro Adobe DMG Image is nearly 5 gigabytes.

Macs can't write NTFS drives, so you have to format in FAT32 (Mac OS Journaled FS is not feasible)...

Actually, I think you're wrong here. Mac OS X can actually read from and write to NTFS formatted drives. The "easy way" to read and write to NTFS partitions in Mac OS X would be by using "raw hard disk access" in virtual box like what they did in this example using OpenSolaris:

Triple Boot, Part 4: Windows via VirtualBox - The Observatory

Now, keep in mind that I have never actually done this in Mac OS X, but I have done it with VirtualBox (and with ntfs3g) in Solaris.

Solaris is a real UNIX operating system and Mac OS X is or claims to be or pretends to be a UNIX operating system too right? So if it works in Solaris it should work in Mac OS X as well since both are POSIX / UNIX systems....

That's my reasoning anyway. Try the NTFS through VirtualBox thing and tell me if it works (I think you can also have a "shared folder" between the VirtualBox guest and the Mac OS X host, so you would copy to the "shared folder" first and then from there to the raw NTFS disk partition and vice versa).

A more advanced / geeky way to directly mount the ntfs partitions without using VirtualBox as a crutch would be to build ntfs3g from source code using gcc and then mount the NTFS partition from the UNIX command line with FUSE / ntfsprogs. If you look at this link below:

NTFS-3G - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

it says that ntfs3g works on Mac OS X, so check on google if someone else already made a pre-compiled binary, or if ntfs3g is in the mac ports tree, if not, build your own binaries from the source code using GNU's gcc compiler.

In my opinion, part of being a "good IT guy" is knowing how to build platform specific binaries directly from the source code using a C compiler like gcc or Sun Studio. So building ntfs3g from source code might be a good learning experience for you.

tiersten

Solaris_UNIX wrote: »

Actually, I think you're wrong here. Mac OS X can actually read from and write to NTFS formatted drives. The "easy way" to read and write to NTFS partitions in Mac OS X would be by using "raw hard disk access" in virtual box like what they did in this example using OpenSolaris.

The user doesn't want to install any software tho

Solaris_UNIX

tiersten wrote: »

The user doesn't want to install any software tho

Ah well, never mind then

hypnotoad

Macs just aren't very enterprise-friendly. Neither are their users.

Forsaken_GA

hypnotoad wrote: »

Macs just aren't very enterprise-friendly. Neither are their users.

You have so much to learn if an interoperability obstacle of this small a degree causes you to resort to this kind of statement.

blargoe

Well, their users ARE a bit of an obstacle anywhere I have worked.

hypnotoad

Forsaken_GA wrote: »

You have so much to learn if an interoperability obstacle of this small a degree causes you to resort to this kind of statement.

Yes, I agree I have a lot to learn. But if I added up all my mac headaches over the years (which all seem like they could be avoided in one fell swoop), I'd still be right.

ally_uk

Can the file be compressed? Second option boot up a linux distro locate the file you want then send it to a NTFS drive just a idea I'm not sure if it would work just thinking outside the box.

what does the customer want to do with the file? tell him to buy a external HD that supports Mac

Forsaken_GA

ally_uk wrote: »

Can the file be compressed? Second option boot up a linux distro locate the file you want then send it to a NTFS drive just a idea I'm not sure if it would work just thinking outside the box.

what does the customer want to do with the file? tell him to buy a external HD that supports Mac

The problem isn't that the external drive doesn't support Macs, the problem is the file systems in use. The Mac's can read and write to FAT32 partitions natively, but there is a file size limitation (not a limitation in the size of the partition, but the size of any one particular file). He lists it above as 2 gigs. I'm fairly certain it's 4 gigs. But regardless, the file he's wanting to move is too large for a FAT32 file system.

There are really two solutions for this problem -

#1 Install software that allows MacOS to read and write NTFS drives. It's probably the simplest and most direct solution.

#2 Transfer the file over the network. In this case, it seems the user himself is the barrier.

I understand the frustration from the OP, but I think it's childish to lash out against the platform and all of it's users just because he encountered one moron. I promise you that, even accounting for market share differential, I have encountered far more Windows Idiots than Mac Idiots, but I refuse to unilaterally label the entire population as such. That would make me more retarded than the person I'm annoyed with.

I'm guessing this is a higher level employee in his company though, otherwise doing something for someone so particular that isn't part of your job duties doesn't make much sense.

hypnotoad

Forsaken_GA wrote: »

I understand the frustration from the OP, but I think it's childish to lash out against the platform and all of it's users just because he encountered one moron.

Nope, this is just the straw that broke the camel's back

No more Mac for me. I'm throwing in the towel.