In Linux, there are many ways to create a virtual file archive. A virtual file archive is a storage file which immitates an inode storage device, meaning its similar to what a physical drive can do but contained in a single archive. So how do we create this virtual file archive? What we will be using is the most primitive way to create a virtual file archive using Linux built in tool set.
The secret to happiness is freedom… And the secret to freedom is courage.
— Thucydides.
Prerequisites
The tooling that we will be using is already built in Linux. To be transparent what I’m currently using is Arch Linux.
- dd
- losetup
- mount
So what do we do now?
Create the file that will be using as file archive.
dd if=/dev/zero of=gem.bin bs=1024 count=0 seek=1G
Setup a loop block device to handle input/output (emulating physical drives).
losetup /dev/loop0 gem.bin
Create the mountable directory.
mkdir -p /mnt/vfa
Mount the loop block device to the mountable directory.
mount -t ext3 /dev/loop0 /mnt/vfa
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Fun Fact
- losetup is used to associate loop devices with regular files or block devices, to detach loop devices and to query the status of a loop device. If only the loopdev argument is given, the status of the corresponding loop device is shown.
- dd is a command-line utility for Unix and Unix-like operating systems, the primary purpose of which is to convert and copy files.
- mount command serves to attach the filesystem found on some device to the big file tree.
