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OPERATING SYSTEM AND SECUIRITY PRACTICAL

COURSE CODE: CYSPGD (102) DATE:

LAB – 01: Identifying the File System of An Operating System

LAB OBJECTIVE - To Identify the File System of Various Operating

Systems Like Windows, Linux Using Appropriate Tools And Commands.

THEORY
A computer file is defined as a medium used for saving and managing data in the computer system. The
data stored in the computer system is completely in digital format, although there can be various types of
files that help us to store the data.
File systems are a crucial part of any opera ng system, providing a structured way to store, organize, and
manage data on storage devices such as hard drives, SSDs, and USB drives. Essen ally, a file system acts as
a bridge between the opera ng system and the physical storage hardware, allowing users and applica ons
to create, read, update, and delete files in an organized and efficient manner.
A file system is a method an opera ng system uses to store, organize, and manage files and directories on a
storage device. Some common types of file systems include:

 LINUX : ext2,ext3,ext4,XFS,btrfs
 WINDOWS : NTFS,FAT32
 ANDROID : ext4,f2fs,FAT32/exFAT

Here we discussed the file system of Windows and Linux opera ng system.

LINUX FILE SYSTEM:

ext2:
The second ext was developed in 1993. It is a non-journaling file system that is preferred to be used with
flash drives and SSDs. It solved the problems of separate mestamp for access, inode modifica on and data
modifica on. Due to not being journaled, it is slow to load at boot me.

ext3:
The third ext developed in 1999 is a journaling file system. It is reliable and unlike ext2, it prevents long
delays at system boot if the file system is in an inconsistent state a er an unclean shutdown. Other factors
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that make it be er and different than ext2 are online file system growth and HTree indexing for large
directories.

ext4:
The fourth ext developed in 2006, is a journaling file system. It has backward compa bility with ext3 and
ext2 and it provides several other features, some of which are persistent pre-alloca on, unlimited number
of subdirectories, metadata checksumming and large file size. ext4 is the default file system for many Linux
distribu ons and also has compa bility with Windows and Macintosh.

XFS:
XFS is a 64-bit journaling file system and was ported to Linux in 2001. It now acts as the default file system
for many Linux distribu ons. It provides features like snapshots, online defragmenta on, sparse files,
variable block sizes, and excellent capacity. It also excels at parallel I/O opera ons.

btrfs (Be er/Bu er/B-tree FS):

It was developed in 2007. It provides many features such as snapsho ng, drive pooling, data scrubbing,
self-healing and online defragmenta on. It is the default file system for Fedora Worksta on.

WINDOWS FILE SYSTEM :

FAT32:
FAT32 stands for File Alloca on Table. FAT32 is an extension of previous file systems in which the data is
stored in chunks of 32 bits. FAT32 is an upgraded version of FAT16 designed to overcome the limita ons of
FAT16 and add support for larger media. FAT32 was used in older versions of opera ng systems like
Windows 95 up un l Windows XP.
FAT32 is the original file system for the Windows opera ng system, having been developed in the 1970s. It
was mainly made for floppy drives with capaci es less than 500 K. Each of the three FAT file systems—
FAT12, FAT16, and FAT32—has a different file size and disc layout. Ini ally, MS-DOS used the FAT file system,
with a maximum hard drive size of 32 MB and sectors par oned into 512 K. It frequently appears in
removable discs and storage devices. A FAT32 drive’s maximum file size is limited to 4 GB, while the size of a
FAT32 par on cannot exceed 8 TB. The lack of security offered by FAT32 is its primary drawback. File
access protec on is absent from FAT16, the prior version of the file system, and thus suffers from internal
fragmenta on.

NTFS:
NTFS stands for New Technology File System. First introduced in 1993, it is used in newer versions of
opera ng systems such as Windows NT and 2000 and later versions of Windows. NTFS is a more robust,
high-performance logging file system with mul -user access control, ACLs, and many other things that
make it appropriate to work with an Opera ng System that has protec on. NTFS includes characteris cs
such as data recovery, mul -streaming, fault tolerance, security, extended file size, and file systems,
UNICODE names. exFAT is used where NTFS is not feasible, due to its data-structure overhead, but a greater
file-size limit than the standard FAT32 file system is needed.
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LAB ENVIRONMENT

REQUIREMENTS:
 A Kali Linux Based System
 A Windows Opera ng System

LAB TASKS

PART – A : IDENTIFYING FILE SYSTEM ON LINUX

All the commands run using KALI LINUX terminal

 Lsblk -f

The lsblk command lists the informa on about available block devices.Running it with the -f op on will
show the file system type of each par on.

 df -T

df -T command reports file system disk space usage,to include the file system type on a par cular disk
par on,use the -T to lists mounted filesystems and their types.

 blkid

Shows the file system type and UUID of all par ons. $sudo blkid
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 sudo file -sL /dev/sda1

This command iden fies the file type.The -s flag enables reading of block or character files and -L enables
following of symlinks.

 Cat /etc/fstab

The /etc/fstab file contains informa on about disk par ons and their associated file systems.Checking this
file can also reveal the file system types cat /etc/fstab.

 mount

Running the mount command without argument shows all mounted file systems along with their types :
mount | grep “^/”

 GParted
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GParted is a graphical tool for managing disk par ons.Run the following command : $sudo gparted

 fsck
It is used to check and op onally repair linux file systems,it can also print the file system type on specified
disk par ons.The flag -N disables checking of the file system for errors.
fsck -N /dev/sda1

PART – B : IDENTIFYING THE FILE SYSTEM ON WINDOWS

 STEP 1

1. Open file explorer and right click on it

2. Then click on to the proper es
3. Then show the en re file system informa on
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 STEP 2

1. Open disk management (Win + X > Disk Management)

2. Then observe the file system types in the file system column

 STEP 3

1. Open Command Prompt (cmd) as an administrator

2. Then run the command : wmic logicaldisk get name,filesystem
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RESULTS

LINUX

COMMAND OUTPUT
lsblk -f ext4
df -T ext4
sudo blkid ext4
/etc/fstab ext4
sudo file -sL ext4
mount | grep “^/” ext4
sudo gparted ext4
fsck -N ext4

WINDOWS:

METHOD FILE SYSTEM TYPE

File Explorer NTFS

Disk Management NTFS

Command Prompt NTFS/FAT32

CONCLUSION

This lab successfully demonstrated the iden fica on of file system on Linux and Windows.Knowing the file
system type is cri cal for tasks like par oning,forma ng,secuirity and ensuring compa bility across
pla orms.
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Signature Of Faculty –