PartitionMagic can now resize ext2 partitions. The code to do this was
written by tytso under contract. There will (after a certain amount of
time) be a standalone ext2resizer. You cannot resize files containing
ext2 partitions now, I understand that. However you don't necessarily
need to. If someone's `just trying it out', they will almost certainly
not need to resize their partition. If they really do, they can be
introduced to the joys of multiple partitions and a single filesystem
hierarchy.
> - You can not read az ext2fs image from dos
There are several tools that do this. There's even a VxD for Windows 95.
> - It will be slow (ok, umsdos is slow too)
Then this is not an argument.
> - A newbie will never be able to set up a looproot distribution
I don't understand what point you're trying to make there. There should
not be any user-visible difference between setting up a looproot and an
umsdosroot distribution.
> - Looproot is problematic and untested (for example it does not work in
> vfat but works on an msdos partition)
Why does it not work on vfat? All it does is use the filesystem bmap()
method. Since vfat's bmap method is in fact the fat bmap method,
I don't think this is possible. Have you tried it?
> I think, a general ums-like pseudo-ext2-fs over not only umsdos, but all
> non unix-compatible fs were very good and useful for the linux community.
I disagree. It would be a lot of work for very little gain. Different
filesystems differ so much that it would be almost impossible, and
even if you did, it would always be a kludge of limited usefulness.
Compared to the loop device which we already have with its multiple uses,
I really don't see the point.
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