Partitions on a loop device ( /dev/loop0p0, /dev/loop0p1, … )

Amain — Wed, 21 Apr 2010 11:38:11 +0000

Add the following kernel boot option to the kernel line in grub’s menu.lst and reboot ( I’m not sure which one does the trick ):
```
loop.max_part=63 max_part=63
```
Create a sparse disk image file ( 40 GB reserved, 0 bytes on disk )
```
dd if=/dev/zero of=fs.image bs=1024 seek=40000000 count=0
```
Initialize a new loop device ( /dev/loop0 )
```
losetup -f fs.image
```
Create a partition table, for example 2 partitions. A 4 GB swap(loop0p1) and a root filesystem(loop0p2) containing the remaining space.
```
fdisk /dev/loop0
```
Reread partition table for /dev/loop0. Nodes /dev/loop0p1, /dev/loop0p2, etc are created.
```
sudo blockdev --rereadpt /dev/loop0
```

Create filesystems

mkswap /dev/loop0p1
mkfs.ext3 /dev/loop0p2

Mount the filesystem and use debootstrap or any other method to create a file system. Don’t forget to install or copy grub to it.
```
mkdir fs
sudo mount /dev/loop0p2 fs
```
Install grub
grub
grub> device (hd0) /dev/loop0
grub> root (hd0,1)
grub> setup (hd0)

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