Sometimes when I try to install Fedora, Windows eats my installation USB stick. Fedora is distributed as a .iso (a CD/DVD image). This image is cleverly designed such that if you dump it, byte for byte, onto a USB stick (not into a filesystem), you get a stick that can be booted. I install by booting this disk, usually in UEFI mode. But sometimes the firmware escapes me and Windows is booted. For example, if I am not quick enough typing ESC / DEL / F12 / whatever to steer the firmware to boot the USB stick. When that happens, Windows always seems to damage the image on the USB stick. What the heck is up with that? When I boot the installation stick, I always choose the option to check the contents before booting Fedora. I do this because the Windows damage is unannounced. I just had it happen again. Here's the damage, as found by cmp(1). I haven't worked hard at analyzing what it is but every changed byte started out as zero. The new bytes don't smell like ASCII (but I'm not great at recognizing ASCII in decimal). Any idea why Windows makes this unprovoked attack on installation sticks? It sure is inconvenient. Since Microsoft is unlikely to fix this Windows bug, would it be worthwhile for Fedora to take countermeasures? For example, ignore exactly those bytes that Windows damages? $ sudo cmp -l Fedora-Workstation-Live-x86_64-28_Beta-1.3.iso /dev/sdg 61462533 0 377 61462534 0 377 61471313 0 377 61471314 0 377 61471315 0 377 61471316 0 377 61472773 0 377 61472774 0 377 61481553 0 377 61481554 0 377 61481555 0 377 61481556 0 377 61483073 0 102 61483074 0 40 61483076 0 111 61483078 0 156 61483080 0 146 61483082 0 157 61483084 0 17 61483086 0 162 61483087 0 162 61483089 0 155 61483091 0 141 61483093 0 164 61483095 0 151 61483097 0 157 61483101 0 156 61483105 0 1 61483106 0 123 61483108 0 171 61483110 0 163 61483112 0 164 61483114 0 145 61483116 0 17 61483118 0 162 61483119 0 155 61483121 0 40 61483123 0 126 61483125 0 157 61483127 0 154 61483129 0 165 61483133 0 155 61483135 0 145 61483137 0 123 61483138 0 131 61483139 0 123 61483140 0 124 61483141 0 105 61483142 0 115 61483143 0 176 61483144 0 61 61483145 0 40 61483146 0 40 61483147 0 40 61483148 0 26 61483150 0 103 61483151 0 223 61483152 0 142 61483153 0 215 61483154 0 114 61483155 0 215 61483156 0 114 61483159 0 224 61483160 0 142 61483161 0 215 61483162 0 114 61483163 0 2 61499393 0 56 61499394 0 40 61499395 0 40 61499396 0 40 61499397 0 40 61499398 0 40 61499399 0 40 61499400 0 40 61499401 0 40 61499402 0 40 61499403 0 40 61499404 0 20 61499406 0 103 61499407 0 223 61499408 0 142 61499409 0 215 61499410 0 114 61499411 0 215 61499412 0 114 61499415 0 224 61499416 0 142 61499417 0 215 61499418 0 114 61499419 0 2 61499425 0 56 61499426 0 56 61499427 0 40 61499428 0 40 61499429 0 40 61499430 0 40 61499431 0 40 61499432 0 40 61499433 0 40 61499434 0 40 61499435 0 40 61499436 0 20 61499438 0 103 61499439 0 223 61499440 0 142 61499441 0 215 61499442 0 114 61499443 0 215 61499444 0 114 61499447 0 224 61499448 0 142 61499449 0 215 61499450 0 114 61499457 0 102 61499458 0 107 61499460 0 165 61499462 0 151 61499464 0 144 61499468 0 17 61499470 0 377 61499471 0 377 61499472 0 377 61499473 0 377 61499474 0 377 61499475 0 377 61499476 0 377 61499477 0 377 61499478 0 377 61499479 0 377 61499480 0 377 61499481 0 377 61499482 0 377 61499485 0 377 61499486 0 377 61499487 0 377 61499488 0 377 61499489 0 1 61499490 0 111 61499492 0 156 61499494 0 144 61499496 0 145 61499498 0 170 61499500 0 17 61499502 0 377 61499503 0 145 61499505 0 162 61499507 0 126 61499509 0 157 61499511 0 154 61499513 0 165 61499517 0 155 61499519 0 145 61499521 0 111 61499522 0 116 61499523 0 104 61499524 0 105 61499525 0 130 61499526 0 105 61499527 0 176 61499528 0 61 61499529 0 40 61499530 0 40 61499531 0 40 61499532 0 40 61499534 0 104 61499535 0 223 61499536 0 142 61499537 0 215 61499538 0 114 61499539 0 215 61499540 0 114 61499543 0 224 61499544 0 142 61499545 0 215 61499546 0 114 61499547 0 50 61499548 0 21 61499549 0 114 61499553 0 102 61499554 0 164 61499558 0 377 61499559 0 377 61499560 0 377 61499561 0 377 61499562 0 377 61499563 0 377 61499564 0 17 61499566 0 316 61499567 0 377 61499568 0 377 61499569 0 377 61499570 0 377 61499571 0 377 61499572 0 377 61499573 0 377 61499574 0 377 61499575 0 377 61499576 0 377 61499577 0 377 61499578 0 377 61499581 0 377 61499582 0 377 61499583 0 377 61499584 0 377 61499585 0 1 61499586 0 127 61499588 0 120 61499590 0 123 61499592 0 145 61499594 0 164 61499596 0 17 61499598 0 316 61499599 0 164 61499601 0 151 61499603 0 156 61499605 0 147 61499607 0 163 61499609 0 56 61499613 0 144 61499615 0 141 61499617 0 127 61499618 0 120 61499619 0 123 61499620 0 105 61499621 0 124 61499622 0 124 61499623 0 176 61499624 0 61 61499625 0 104 61499626 0 101 61499627 0 124 61499628 0 40 61499630 0 106 61499631 0 223 61499632 0 142 61499633 0 215 61499634 0 114 61499635 0 215 61499636 0 114 61499639 0 224 61499640 0 142 61499641 0 215 61499642 0 114 61499643 0 51 61499644 0 21 61499645 0 14 70490113 0 173 70490115 0 71 70490117 0 101 70490119 0 67 70490121 0 64 70490123 0 105 70490125 0 106 70490127 0 67 70490129 0 70 70490131 0 55 70490133 0 104 70490135 0 63 70490137 0 104 70490139 0 61 70490141 0 55 70490143 0 64 70490145 0 64 70490147 0 64 70490149 0 102 70490151 0 55 70490153 0 71 70490155 0 64 70490157 0 60 70490159 0 61 70490161 0 55 70490163 0 103 70490165 0 66 70490167 0 104 70490169 0 70 70490171 0 64 70490173 0 60 70490175 0 71 70490177 0 102 70490179 0 71 70490181 0 60 70490183 0 67 70490185 0 105 70490187 0 175 70492161 0 14 70492165 0 137 70492166 0 344 70492167 0 351 70492168 0 77 70492169 0 207 70492170 0 144 70492171 0 2 70492172 0 305 cmp: EOF on Fedora-Workstation-Live-x86_64-28_Beta-1.3.iso after byte 1933574144 _______________________________________________ users mailing list -- users@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx To unsubscribe send an email to users-leave@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
