Geom, MBR, labels, and usb sticks

[Dave Hayes]

Hello. ;) I am attempting to format my own custom bootable USB stick on 
FreeBSD 8.3 and ran into some issues and questions. My USB stick is at 
da0, and here's the sequence of what I am trying to do:

  # gpart destroy -F da0
  da0 destroyed
  # gpart create -s MBR da0
  da0 created
  # gpart add -s32m -t \!14 da0
  da0s1 added
  # gpart set -a active -i 1 da0
  active set on da0s1
  # gpart add -t freebsd da0
  da0s2 added
  # gpart show da0s2
  =>       0  15567804  da0s2  BSD  (7.4G)
           0        16      2  freebsd-ufs  (8.0k)
          16  15567788      1  freebsd-ufs  (7.4G)

Now I want to label the partition da0s2a. From the documentation in the 
man pages, I seem to be being told that

  # gpart modify -l foo -i 1 da0s2a

will not work, and it doesn't:

  gpart: Invalid argument

So let's try newfs:

  # newfs -L foo /dev/da0s2a
  ...
  # gpart show -l da0s2
  =>       0  15567804  da0s2  BSD  (7.4G)
           0        16      2  (null)  (8.0k)
          16  15567788      1  (null)  (7.4G)

and still the labels do not show up. I really do want to be able to 
mount /dev/ufs/foo as the root device, but as I understand things if 
gpart doesn't show the label then the glabel subsystem won't set up the 
proper device file.

What gives here? Am I missing something important?

Thanks in advance.
-- 
Dave Hayes - Consultant - Altadena CA, USA - dave at jetcafe.org
 >>>> *The opinions expressed above are entirely my own* <<<<

To the sick, sweet water tastes bitter in the mouth.