Snow Leopard's Boot Camp Includes HFS+ Windows Drivers

[MacRumors]

http://www.macrumors.com/images/macrumorsthreadlogo.gif (http://www.macrumors.com/2009/05/06/snow-leopards-boot-camp-includes-hfs-windows-drivers/)

MacRumors has learned that Apple's Boot Camp utility under Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard will include Windows HFS+ drivers, which will allow Windows installations to read Mac OS X HFS+ formatted partitions.

Boot Camp (http://www.apple.com/macosx/features/bootcamp.html) is Apple's software package that allows customers to boot Microsoft's Windows operating system on their Intel Macs. The Boot Camp package includes the necessary Windows drivers to support each Mac's hardware. Windows, however, does not routinely recognize Mac formatted hard drives and is unable to read or write to them without special drivers. The newest version of Snow Leopard's Boot Camp appears to include these special drivers to allow read access to Mac data even under Windows.

The move should make it easier for customers to switch between Windows and Mac operating systems by allowing files to be more easily transfered back and forth. Up until now, customers would have to rely on third-party utilities such as Mediafour's MacDrive (http://www.mediafour.com/products/macdrive/) to accomplish the same task.

Article Link: Snow Leopard's Boot Camp Includes HFS+ Windows Drivers (http://www.macrumors.com/2009/05/06/snow-leopards-boot-camp-includes-hfs-windows-drivers/)

[Boneoh]

Cool! Another small piece of the puzzle to make things easier.

[Virtualball]

Ya, this seems like a very easy way to have mac files become infected with virii. Sure, they wont do anything on the mac side, but if you want to transfer your files to a PC user...

[Tsurisuto]

Now this to me is an amazing feature. That's one thing that I disliked about using a Mac partitioned Hard Drive on a Windows installation.

But what about ZFS?

[Biolizard]

Wonder whether this will also go on general release on t'Internet? Maybe we can finally get rid of FAT32 as the lowest common denominator. Might also encourage M$ to be more open on NTFS, or risk losing out to the competition.

[Santa Rosa]

Hope this is included in the final shipped version of Snow Leopard. Have been using HFS Explorer (http://hem.bredband.net/catacombae/hfsx.html) to tide me over. It does the job but its not really the best of solutions.

Didn't want to go down the MacDrive route because it wasn't free and wasn't sure how much I would use it.

[revs]

read-only would be nice, otherwise there is the risk of virii getting to the Mac files

[kinless]

Nice, Apple.

The next thing on the list is to be able to write to NTFS-formatted drives. But I suppose Microsoft needs to have a hand in that. *sigh*

[ChrisA]

So doe this mean that PC viruses can infect Mac partitions more easier?

Yes. It means that problems with the PC can now easily spill over onto your Mac.

What I would recommend is NOT giving Windows access to the entire disk. Make a partition with just the data that needs to be shared. For example maybe just your iTunes library. But certainly not the applications or system folders

[Ade-iMac-177]

Awesome!! i hope it is full read/write support. I really hope they add full read/write support for NTFS on the mac too.

[longofest]

read-only would be nice, otherwise there is the risk of virii getting to the Mac files

my thoughts exactly. let's keep it read-only.

Awesome!! i hope it is full read/write support. I really hope they add full read/write support for NTFS on the mac too.

negative on write support. See above posts regarding viruses.

NTFS support would require a Microsoft license, so that's probably not going to happen.

[tongteh]

so now under leopard, if i want to read and write a windows format harddisc? what are the workarounds?

[Revelation78]

I've got high hopes that Time Machine will finally be able to backup the Windows Partition. At least it would be nice to have it all done by one system.

[longofest]

Yes. It means that problems with the PC can now easily spill over onto your Mac.

What I would recommend is NOT giving Windows access to the entire disk. Make a partition with just the data that needs to be shared. For example maybe just your iTunes library. But certainly not the applications or system folders

You're incorrect here... viruses could only propagate if there was full read/write support.

[soup4you2]

It would be nice if you can control the read or write behavior. So you can set up 1 disk as RW, and the rest as RO.

But having fined grained controls like that is not apple's style from what I've gathered over the years.

Even still it's a definite bonus, i was actually planning on purchasing a MacDrive license.. think I'll wait now.

[david279]

This makes me happy. Now add zfs to make time machine absolute.

[Cander]

Now how about fixing the multi touch trackpad drivers so that it doesn't keep blue screening and crashing out web browsers on a site using Flash. :(

[flopticalcube]

One step closer to fast OS switching.... I hope.

[Diode]

That's awesome!

I've hated using macdrive as a solution.

[jgbhardy]

All very good, but is there anyway to use the media keys whilst running windows? Which may include running the full 64bit?

[BTW]

Yippie! This will be nice having access to the HFS+ volume while in Vista.

Now if they'll just virtualize Vista in a window under OSX that would be even sweeter. :D

[MrRage]

hmm... I would only want read only access from windows. Dam viruses.

[KingYaba]

So much for no new features. :rolleyes:

[robinp]

will this work with mac os x software RAID volumes?

[bbotte]

my VMware Fusion PC already does this....

VMWare Fusion > Bootcamp

[Peace]

*cough* http://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?p=7559867&highlight=lookie#post7559867 *cough*

[TheNoel]

Thank God.

This was a huge issue for me when I first installed Windows 7 to a partition. Luckily, a friend referred me to some third party drivers that allowed me to transfer files across the partition.

[fleshman03]

GREAT News. I'm gonna love being able to access files larger than 2gb on my Windows Drive.

[stainlessliquid]

About time, hopefully they do a better job at supporting operating systems than Mac Drive does. I imagine the driver should work fine on PCs as well.
Nice, Apple.

The next thing on the list is to be able to write to NTFS-formatted drives. But I suppose Microsoft needs to have a hand in that. *sigh*

Pretty sure thats already a listed feature in 10.6

[Tastic Bycrom]

OK, seriously, just how many of you think that Windows is a cesspool of virii? If you update window regularly and don't install "awesome-p0rn-movie.exe", you won't have very many problems.

I don't care much for Windows either, but c'mon! Full read/write support for HFS+ is a good thing!

[kastenbrust]

read-only would be nice, otherwise there is the risk of virii getting to the Mac files

Are you insane? Macs cant get Windows viruses! A windows virus simply wont work on a Mac because they're in the DLL or .EXE format which Mac's cant, and will never be able to run :rolleyes:

Im sorry but this warrants a facepalm.

[illegallydead]

Awesome. This would make Macdrive and such obsolete, which would be great in my book as I am currently wanting to do whatever I can to spite Mediafour over their money-grabbing nonsense of eventually forcing people to upgrade (and pay again) to run Macdrive on Win7.

And please, give us the option of full read/write support. That way it will shut up whiners on here that are scared to death of a virus, and will allow us that actually want/need full support to have that, too.

I call you whiners for a few reasons:
a) I have had numerous windows machines and bootcamp installs over the past 4 years, and the only time I have ever found a virus was when my machine scanned another computer on the network and found one on another computer
b) I have had Vista and Win7 running in Boot Camp this past year, with no anti-virus. That has been with the machine in and out of public networks, visiting some questionable websites and downloading torrents. And I have been 100% fine
c) I have had said Vista install running with Macdrive (full read/write) for about a year, and have never ever had the slightest problem or worry of viruses getting between the two.
d) Remember, Macs are still a small market share, and people are not writing viruses for them at this point. Plus, if you hit an infected site, it's going to see a WINDOWS machine, and attempt to infect a WINDOWS install.

Personally, I am not in the least bit scared of my Mac getting infected by Windows. If it does, well, that is why I keep regular Time Machine backups, and if I ever were to get infected, the 30 minutes to restore is fine in my book as the price to pay in the remote event that something happens...

[tk421]

Ya, this seems like a very easy way to have mac files become infected with virii...

read-only would be nice, otherwise there is the risk of virii getting to the Mac files

OK, seriously, just how many of you think that Windows is a cesspool of virii?...

What the hell is "virii?" The Oxford American Dictionary says "viruses." (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plural_of_virus#Virus)

[deconstruct60]

You're incorrect here... viruses could only propagate if there was full read/write support.

Remember this is reading from the Windows side; so some flavor of Windows is running. The propagation vector is through Windows.

Who cares about propagate if it has already infected your Windows side. That's over. If the virus/trojan/etc. objective is to steal you personal information, then reading is all the access it needs. (e.g., pull out your address book and send what looks like a personal email from you to your friends as a transmission vector, pick up your cookies from your accounts, etc. ). The virus has read/write access on the windows side if you haven't stopped it there. It can already get some disk space and download more code at that point. You are then at the moment of trying to limit its access at that point after your first line of defensive failed. Read only access is still access.

Same reason why it is good practice to have a separate "Administration" account from the account you use everyday. In that set up much of that account's info and the more sensitive "root" info is read protected from the user inside of Mac OS X.

If the driver is aware of permissions on HFS+ and the accounts on Windows have limited access that would more match the standard security policy when in Mac OS X mode (it is active). However, if this driver "blows past" all the permissions on the HFS+ volume that is a bad thing. You've deactivated security and never a good thing.



If there is no "need" for access (e.g., MacOS X code, libraries, OS files , etc.) shouldn't even have read. Multiple layers of security are most effective.

[soup4you2]

Are you insane? Macs cant get Windows viruses! A windows virus simply wont work on a Mac because they're in the DLL or .EXE format which Mac's cant, and will never be able to run :rolleyes:

Im sorry but this warrants a facepalm.

I believe he was talking about being booted into the windows side, in which case yes he will be reading .DLL, .EXE or whatever the hell else he downloads. And depending upon the virus it could wipe out the Mac partitions if it had RW attributes.

[ThunderSkunk]

I dunno, we tried boot camp, parallels and VMware for months, and:

Parallels was too weak, but coherence was very slick
Boot Camp was just, well, only as good as using windows gets.
VMware allowed us to config the oomph we need to run Autodesk Inventor, without having to leave the OSX environment completely.

Parallels had the best cross-platform file access of the three though. VMware we still fight with occasionally. Windows via BootCamp was always a hassle.

Maybe this will change things.

[SirOmega]

Read-only isn't too bad. The problem of course is that I'll have to have a 200GB NTFS partition and a 200GB HFS+ partition, in Windows I have to read the files from the HFS+ partition and write them to the NTFS drive, then the opposite on the mac side.

No, I cant use FAT32 since I am dealing with files larger than 4GB. I really wish there was some universal file system that I could use from all OSes... maybe the one Oracle was working on to replace ext3, ext4, etc.

[Tastic Bycrom]

What the hell is "virii?" The Oxford American Dictionary says "viruses." (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plural_of_virus#Virus)

Heh... fair enough.

[Data]

This is just great news, another reason why 10.6 will be worth the 129,-

[illegallydead]

Read-only isn't too bad. The problem of course is that I'll have to have a 200GB NTFS partition and a 200GB HFS+ partition, in Windows I have to read the files from the HFS+ partition and write them to the NTFS drive, then the opposite on the mac side.

No, I cant use FAT32 since I am dealing with files larger than 4GB. I really wish there was some universal file system that I could use from all OSes... maybe the one Oracle was working on to replace ext3, ext4, etc.

It really is a shame that there is no decent universal format. I was hoping for FAT64, but the b*stards in Redmond swooped that up and licensed it as exFAT, and so far ONLY Vista/Win7 can use it.

Come on someone, solve our Formatting woes!

[*LTD*]

Heh... fair enough.

Yeah, I was about to mention the correction myself, but I didn't want to be "THAT guy" . . . ;)

[j-a-x]

That's great. I hate the lack of HFS in Windows. I can't even use my non FAT32 flash drive on the windows machines in my lab. I actually have 2 partitions now, one for FAT32 and one for HFS (which is much faster for much of what I am backing up).

[ColinEC]

Wow this is great, it'll save a lot of time (and money) to have to download MacDrive.

[zorinlynx]

support would require a Microsoft license, so that's probably not going to happen.

Nope, check out NTFS-3g. Free NTFS filesystem driver for Mac OS X, no license required.

It can even create NTFS filesystems from scratch!

I think NTFS-3g is good enough and don't really need Apple to build it in. But it would be nice for everyone to have NTFS write support without having to download anything extra, of course. :)

[fmaxwell]

The next thing on the list is to be able to write to NTFS-formatted drives. But I suppose Microsoft needs to have a hand in that. *sigh*

(zorinlynx just beat me to the punch with NTFS-3G!)

Macs with OS X have been able to write NTFS-formatted partitions for a long time now. See http://macntfs-3g.blogspot.com/. Also Google MacFUSE and MacFusion for more info on getting OS X to handle other non-native formats.

But let's not get too excited about Apple making it possible for Windows to read HFS+ partitions. Doing so gives Windows access to all of your data -- so any spyware that got into Windows would be able to access your unencrypted private files. That would include correspondence or forms with your Social Security number, bank account numbers, credit card numbers, login IDs, passwords, phone number, children's names, medical records, etc.

If you use it, take the appropriate precautions (encryption, limitations on what partitions you let it see if you have multiple, etc.).

[kastenbrust]

I believe he was talking about being booted into the windows side, in which case yes he will be reading .DLL, .EXE or whatever the hell else he downloads. And depending upon the virus it could wipe out the Mac partitions if it had RW attributes.

A virus could possibly read your personal files, but in order to read any system files, or modify any personal files or system files due to the Unix setup of OS X it would require your OS X admin password.

Its common sense, when you have two Mac users setup on one computer, one user cant simply modify the other users files, its simply not possible without passwords, this isnt Windoze :rolleyes:

[0SXPERT]

There is a way to read and write ntfs drives on your Mac partition and it isn't that hard. You can find info about it on the top post here: www.osxpert.blogspot.com


(I didn't really know the rule about posting outside links, but I feel that this can be very helpful. If I'm breaking a rule just tell me and I'll edit it out.)

[SydneyDev]

Is it a read/write driver? If it can write, will it keep the fsevents logs up to date, so Time Machine will still work?

[nagromme]

Sounds like a great missing piece of the puzzle for some users.

Just please make it optional :o And when you turn it on, give users a clear warning!

Virtualization is sounding better and better...

[iSee]

read-only would be nice, otherwise there is the risk of virii getting to the Mac files

my thoughts exactly. let's keep it read-only.



negative on write support. See above posts regarding viruses.

...

Ridiculous. That's far too limiting. It's OK as an option for the scaredy-cats, but that would disrupt a lot of common usage patterns.

[deconstruct60]

I really wish there was some universal file system that I could use from all OSes... maybe the one Oracle was working on to replace ext3, ext4, etc.

There are more "universal" network file systems. The premise of most operating systems is that the machine they are on is for that operating system.
Mac OS X does NFS. However, windows doesn't do that out of the box (at least the home/workstation versions). Mac OS X does SAMBA. If you have both partitions running at the same time you can share.

If you have lots of files to share between multiple computers looks into a dedicated file server. However, for very large ones and one OS at a time can see why might want to just pull them straight off the disk.

The overhead for the more modern versions of file systems is that they are journaled and not trivial to implement. ( there is no simple "driver" that is going to get you a correctly functioning journaled FS . If all doing is reading that can blow off the journaling and correctness aspects. ).

By the way, no hope in the Linux ones, including BTRFS (the ZFS-like file system lead by Oracle) is Linux only (like ext3, ext4, etc. ). Besides BTRFS is seriously not ready for prime time. It somewhat works, but not ready for critical data. Probably won't be for a while. (Sun worked on ZFS for years. ). Potentially even more cloudy once the deal closes with Sun and Oracle owns ZFS. How many clones of ZFS do you need when you own the original?

[kastenbrust]

There is a way to read and write ntfs drives on your Mac partition and it isn't that hard. You can find info about it on the top post here: www.osxpert.blogspot.com


(I didn't really know the rule about posting outside links, but I feel that this can be very helpful. If I'm breaking a rule just tell me and I'll edit it out.)

we already know that, this thread is discussing the reverse, reading HFS (mac formatted) from Windows.

[CaryMacGuy]

Now if they could only add tap to click and two finger tap to right click on the Macbooks (and the gestures on the newer Macbooks), we would be in business.

[cuestakid]

Apple is smart enough to know that if it allows for full read/write support then one of the entire company's biggest selling points (no viruses) goes down in flames. I really don't think they would allow any kind of write capability. Even if it is for only specific places viruses can replicate themselves and spread to the entire system. So I would think (and hope) that it is only read support for this simple fact

[0SXPERT]

we already know that, this thread is discussing the reverse, reading HFS (mac formatted) from Windows.

I already understand that, but there was alteast one post on the front page that said that he wished now that now the only thing lacking was being able to do the same thing from your mac partition, so clearly he didn't know about it and there may be others who don't either.

[Burai]

Some of you are just hysterical. Here are some handy tips for those of you who are upset that Apple just saved the rest of us some serious aggravation and increased our productivity at the expense of your virgin Mac experience;

1) Install antivirus and spyware protection on your Bootcamp Windows install. You should be doing this anyway. I shouldn't need to have to tell you this.
2) Just don't bother installing the HFS+ driver.
3) Just remove your Bootcamp partition as you're clearly not doing anything useful with it.

[deconstruct60]

a) I have had numerous windows machines and bootcamp installs over the past 4 years, and the only time I have ever found a virus was when my machine scanned another computer on the network and found one on another computer


The days of infecting machines to destroy things and/or be disruptive are passing. More and more folks are creating vectors to steal and make money. That destroying/disruptive stuff is counter productive to being a professional thief.

For the folks who are ahead of the curve of the microsoft patches, you are wide up. Granted most of the stuff that makes the widespread news comes after the Microsoft patches. However, the notion that a static version of Windows, on the bad internet, over several years is safe is an overstatement.

If you have been picking up the steady stream of critical patches for the last couple of years... not sure why want to spin it is "safe".

[Macminiintel]

read-only would be nice, otherwise there is the risk of virii getting to the Mac files

A windows virus isn't going to do anything to Mac OS X, its meant for a totally different kernel

[rwilliams]

This is good news. Now if Apple can be bothered to include better fan support (i.e. turning them on AT ALL) in Boot Camp in the newer MacBook/MBPs, I'll be a happy customer.

[kennycheng93]

Can boot cam boot Linux?

[illegallydead]

The days of infecting machines to destroy things and/or be disruptive are passing. More and more folks are creating vectors to steal and make money. That destroying/disruptive stuff is counter productive to being a professional thief.

For the folks who are ahead of the curve of the microsoft patches, you are wide up. Granted most of the stuff that makes the widespread news comes after the Microsoft patches. However, the notion that a static version of Windows, on the bad internet, over several years is safe is an overstatement.

If you have been picking up the steady stream of critical patches for the last couple of years... not sure why want to spin it is "safe".

All I'm saying is that in years of running these supposedly "unsafe" environments, I have never had an issue. And obviously I have gotten patches and updates, arguing over a static machine is not what we are doing here :rolleyes:. OSX ain't infallible either. Are you saying that Apple releasing updates and patches from time to time also means that OSX is unsafe?

Patches or no, I am saying that Windows is, in my experience, not the plague that many holier-than-though fanboys on here make it out to be. Please, give me the option of full read/write. If you are scared of Windows getting it's "dirty hands" on you OSX drive, than turn it off.

[mzeb]

Are you insane? Macs cant get Windows viruses! A windows virus simply wont work on a Mac because they're in the DLL or .EXE format which Mac's cant, and will never be able to run :rolleyes:

Im sorry but this warrants a facepalm.

Remember, windows executables are recognized by mac os x as such. Mac OS X can't run windows binaries now, but who knows what they're planning... think wine-ish stuff written by apple. Could be interesting.

[SPUY767]

so now under leopard, if i want to read and write a windows format harddisc? what are the workarounds?

Google it. I've got a R/W NTFS driver on my Mac Pro, but I've had it so long I have no Idea where I got it.

[soup4you2]

Can boot cam boot Linux?

Yes, i have mine setup with 3 partitions on the main drive, 1 Mac OS, the other Slackware linux and the other Vista x64.

[Data]

Nope, check out NTFS-3g. Free NTFS filesystem driver for Mac OS X, no license required.

It can even create NTFS filesystems from scratch!

I think NTFS-3g is good enough and don't really need Apple to build it in. But it would be nice for everyone to have NTFS write support without having to download anything extra, of course. :)


Last time i tried that about 3 weeks ago, i formatted a drive with that driver to ntfs, to get a windows friend to be able to put some files on it from his windows machine, and his machine did not recognize the drive at all, het had to reformat it from within XP, so i am very happy that apple will now take care of the ntfs compatability ;-).

[harodude]

I wonder how much this will hurt MediaFour. It will be nice not having to rely on an app to mount my HFS, but it did do a great job...

Can't wait for this update!

[illegallydead]

Google it. I've got a R/W NTFS driver on my Mac Pro, but I've had it so long I have no Idea where I got it.

Perhaps this (http://www.paragon-software.com/home/ntfs-mac/)? Have it and love it, works flawless, although not exactly the poster-child of speed...

[chaosbunny]

I prefer my gaming partition NOT interfering my work partition... but if it's up to me to install these drivers or not, no problem. If I'm forced to use them when using bootcamp this sucks.

[rhpenguin]

so now under leopard, if i want to read and write a windows format harddisc? what are the workarounds?

NTFS3G

http://macntfs-3g.blogspot.com/

[mryan]

For those that are complaining about getting viruses on your Mac drive...

I've been using PCs (IBM-compatible / DOS / Windows) for over 20 years, and I don't believe my systems have been infected more than perhaps 5 times, and not once within the past 5 years. Granted, I've *received* far, far more, typically through email attachments, but that's what "internet security" and "anti-virus" software is for. If you're not running that, then you have *no* reason to complain. Get Kaspersky Anti-Virus or one of the other quality anti-virus products on the market.

I've been using MacDrive for a while now, and unsurprisingly discovered zero viruses on my Mac. Nor has it received a virus from any of the many network-stored files shared by other PCs on my home network.

Oh, and virii is *not* a word. The only plural form of virus is "viruses".

[TheStonepedo]

Last time i tried that about 3 weeks ago, i formatted a drive with that driver to ntfs, to get a windows friend to be able to put some files on it from his windows machine, and his machine did not recognize the drive at all, het had to reformat it from within XP, so i am very happy that apple will now take care of the ntfs compatability ;-).
32-bit Windows doesn't, so far as I know, work with GUID partition tables (GPT - the way new Intel Macs format partitions). Were the disk using an MBR partition table his XP machine would have instantly recognized your NTFS partition. Nothing is inherently wrong with MBR, as it works fine for "normal" Windows installations that typically have a single partition containing all user and system data. GPT is fairly well-suited to the filesystem hierarchies of *NIX operating systems that can nest multiple filesystems symbolically within each other - sometimes it is nice to separate user data from applications, logs, caches, etc. rather than putting all of one's eggs in one basket.

[enb141]

32-bit Windows doesn't, so far as I know, work with GUID partition tables (GPT - the way new Intel Macs format partitions). Were the disk using an MBR partition table his XP machine would have instantly recognized your NTFS partition. Nothing is inherently wrong with MBR, as it works fine for "normal" Windows installations that typically have a single partition containing all user and system data. GPT is fairly well-suited to the filesystem hierarchies of *NIX operating systems that can nest multiple filesystems symbolically within each other - sometimes it is nice to separate user data from applications, logs, caches, etc. rather than putting all of one's eggs in one basket.

32 bit vista can read GPT but can't boot from GPT only x64 by the way a virus can delete HFS+ files if they have access to read/write.

A control panel with the option to enable read/write would be cool.

[chaosbunny]

For those that are complaining about getting viruses on your Mac drive...

I've been using PCs (IBM-compatible / DOS / Windows) for over 20 years, and I don't believe my systems have been infected more than perhaps 5 times, and not once within the past 5 years. Granted, I've *received* far, far more, typically through email attachments, but that's what "internet security" and "anti-virus" software is for. If you're not running that, then you have *no* reason to complain. Get Kaspersky Anti-Virus or one of the other quality anti-virus products on the market.

And what's that got to do with anything? What YOU did with YOUR machines? Got any other statistics than the couple of computers YOU owned? If not, then better don't make generalisations.

A control panel with the option to enable read/write would be cool.

Sign!

[arkmannj]

I'd prefer Read Only HFS+ driver for windows and a Read/wright driver for NTFS under Mac OS X

Maybe the windows driver would have an option with boot-camp if you would like the driver to be Read only or not, for those that need it.

[Saladinos]

Apple is smart enough to know that if it allows for full read/write support then one of the entire company's biggest selling points (no viruses) goes down in flames. I really don't think they would allow any kind of write capability. Even if it is for only specific places viruses can replicate themselves and spread to the entire system. So I would think (and hope) that it is only read support for this simple fact

err... no.

This is a fantastic addition. It makes dual-booting Windows and OSX much more user friendly. I could see Apple trying to push HFS+ as a standard compatible filesystem.

Any convoluted potential security issues are all a result of using Windows. If something like this does happen and I discover that this policy was responsible, what would I do? I'd certainly have to stop dual-booting, but it'd be Windows that I drop.

[METOO999]

Finally, goodbye to buggy BSODing Macdrive and their overpriced shareware.

[enb141]

I'd prefer Read Only HFS+ driver for windows and a Read/wright driver for NTFS under Mac OS X

Maybe the windows driver would have an option with boot-camp if you would like the driver to be Read only or not, for those that need it.

If apple is making the driver for read write it will be safer than using a third party non made from microsoft to read write NTFS, look NTFS is not safe under mac either.

Mac drive once ago corrupted my mac partition, fortunately I could save my data and re format.

http://netkas.org/?p=92

[SPUY767]

Perhaps this (http://www.paragon-software.com/home/ntfs-mac/)? Have it and love it, works flawless, although not exactly the poster-child of speed...

Nope, mine was definitely free.

[DELLsFan]

OK, seriously, just how many of you think that Windows is a cesspool of virii? If you update window regularly and don't install "awesome-p0rn-movie.exe", you won't have very many problems.

I don't care much for Windows either, but c'mon! Full read/write support for HFS+ is a good thing!

+1 QFT

Are you insane? Macs cant get Windows viruses! A windows virus simply wont work on a Mac because they're in the DLL or .EXE format which Mac's cant, and will never be able to run :rolleyes:

Im sorry but this warrants a facepalm.

+2 QFT

I believe he was talking about being booted into the windows side, in which case yes he will be reading .DLL, .EXE or whatever the hell else he downloads. And depending upon the virus it could wipe out the Mac partitions if it had RW attributes.

No, not yet, but rather than focus on the virus, how about we focus on the behavior that acquired it instead?

Ridiculous. That's far too limiting. It's OK as an option for the scaredy-cats, but that would disrupt a lot of common usage patterns.

Yes, it would. OK as an option, please. It's bad behavior and practice that causes infection on a Windows machine, not an up-to-date, patched, virus shielded system, behind a router. Mac users should thank Microsoft and PC users for being the larger target today by the whackers than Apple computers. One day this might change and the Mac kernel won't be able to protect you from your own bad behavior.

Some of you are just hysterical. Here are some handy tips for those of you who are upset that Apple just saved the rest of us some serious aggravation and increased our productivity at the expense of your virgin Mac experience;

1) Install antivirus and spyware protection on your Bootcamp Windows install. You should be doing this anyway. I shouldn't need to have to tell you this.
2) Just don't bother installing the HFS+ driver.
3) Just remove your Bootcamp partition as you're clearly not doing anything useful with it.
4) Keep the Windows OS patched and up-to-date.

Added a little to this for educational purposes, but QFT, nonetheless.

:apple:

[mac jones]

When i first heard this I felt sorry for the makers of Macdrive.

Then I remembered how it trashed my Mac partition (twice) after going into hibernation (a reasonable desire, I think), there being no documentation about this rather serious bug I'm pretty sure.

This is fixed now apparently (after years of silence).

[Mahoney]

Asking for a bit much here perhaps, but if they could get it so that the Bootcamp partition used your Mac home folder as the Windows one, that really would be something.

[Consultant]

NOOOO....

Makes it easier for windows viruses / trojans to steal information on the OSX partition.

Make it limited please.


Yes. It means that problems with the PC can now easily spill over onto your Mac.

What I would recommend is NOT giving Windows access to the entire disk. Make a partition with just the data that needs to be shared. For example maybe just your iTunes library. But certainly not the applications or system folders

Or just use a thumbdrive. 8gb can be had for around $10 now.

[Lesser Evets]

GOOD. I hated using my PC side because of the inability to transfer info.

[mflender]

NTFS support would require a Microsoft license, so that's probably not going to happen.

NTFS r/w support in Mac OS X can be downloaded for free here.
http://macntfs-3g.blogspot.com/

[gmcalpin]

So much for no new features. :rolleyes:

That word that has been use and quoted in article after article was "concentrate." Concentrating on performance and efficiency rather than user-focused features does not mean "no new features."
NOOOO....

Makes it easier for windows viruses / trojans to steal information on the OSX partition.

Make it limited please.
Make it have the OPTION of being limited, please.

[kennycheng93]

Yes, i have mine setup with 3 partitions on the main drive, 1 Mac OS, the other Slackware linux and the other Vista x64.

Thanks for the info. I have one more question:

I have 64 bit Ubuntu 9. Will it work on Leopard?

[dolphin842]

I'm perfectly happy with using NTFS-3G/MacFuse in OS X for cross-platform transfers. I can pull stuff out of Windows-land and put stuff back in from the mac side. I wouldn't trust Windows with write access to my OS X partition.

[cg0def]

gimme gimme

[cfttester]

Support for the HFS+ is a nice feature, but what about a TON of other problems in the BootCamp? Did they fixed the trackpad driver or the sound driver?

[Bubba Satori]

read-only would be nice, otherwise there is the risk of virii getting to the Mac files

Yeah, right.


http://blogs.zdnet.com/security/?p=3346
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2009/01/22/mac_trojan_attack/
http://www.informationweek.com/news/hardware/mac/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=212700677
http://macblips.dailyradar.com/story/mac_os_antivirus_utilities_1/
http://news.cnet.com/8301-1009_3-10110852-83.html

[andiwm2003]

read-only would be nice, otherwise there is the risk of virii getting to the Mac files

what are virii?;) viruses?

anyway, good point because this could compromise data safety.

[RichardI]

I assume that the new version of Boot Camp would allow installations of Windows 7 or Vista?
For me personally, I would only need to see the Mac HD and be able to copy data files from it only. No programs. That sounds really good to me.

Rich :cool:

[guzhogi]

Sounds useful. I'd prefer Read AND Write support. Viruses can wipe out your system, but people really should use common sense & a good anti-virus. Plus, even though Macs might not be able to run Windows viruses, Macs can still pass them on to other computers via e-mail or whatever. Some people seem to forget that. Just my 2¢

[portishead]

NTFS r/w support in Mac OS X can be downloaded for free here.
http://macntfs-3g.blogspot.com/

edit: nm, finally got it to work with the latest build. yay!

[deconstruct60]

All I'm saying is that in years of running these supposedly "unsafe" environments, I have never had an issue.


Never had an issue that you know about. If not running any antivirus/security anything... how would you know? Or this is just a statement that the security software has never informed you there was a problem.


OSX ain't infallible either. Are you saying that Apple releasing updates and patches from time to time also means that OSX is unsafe?


Never said it was. What I'm challenging is the notion that your safe because you haven't had any balant visible indicators. In the window before you got your windows patch/update you WERE vulernable. You may have happened to get lucky before. Hey, Bernie Madoff got lucky for long time... that didn't mean he wasn't running a ponzi scheme.

This is more so layers of security and containing the breach if you happen to get one in a single layer. Also of software that turns security/permissions that are normally "on" to "off".




Patches or no, I am saying that Windows is, in my experience, not the plague that many holier-than-though fanboys on here make it out to be.


Kind of wonder how these gangs have zombie PC networks with many, many thousands of computers on them if Windows is so inherently secure.


The problem with windows is that it is under constant attack. Can't find the article now but if doing a clean from disk install of windows on many common access ISPs you'll be probe scanned several times before can get the all the recent patches downloaded from Microsoft. [ Ok can put yourself behind a firewall with a home router... but non the less. ] The other problem with windows is that they had RPC bugs (i.e., remote invocation vectors. )

However, yes if have a NTFS mount/read software on the Mac OS X side, again is not a good idea to give access to the Win32 or config/private files of the users on the windows side from the mac side unless "need" access. ( if the disk mounting software blows aways permissions/ACLs then you are disabling security, which generally is bad. )



Please, give me the option of full read/write.


As said in another response somewhat dubious that "write" really works well ( just as safe as when the Mac OS X native HFS+ is acccessing the bits). Personally I rather have software that wrotes correctly than has more features that doesn't work right when in critical situations. Implementing a FS that isn't destructive over crashes and/or disk glitches is not easy.

And read/write should come with the security model that the underlying file system is susppose to be providing also. If have that to leverage can limit damage and have read/write.

However, in some cases this stuff is a hack that gives the rough approximation that are promptly accessing and writing to the files. It will work as long as don't breathe on it too hard.

[Bad Paper]

Have been using HFS Explorer (http://hem.bredband.net/catacombae/hfsx.html) to tide me over. It does the job but its not really the best of solutions.I have tried this, but I can't get it to work. It claims that it can't find any Mac partition on my disk.

[Stridder44]

High-five Apple!! :D This is fantastic news!

[Eidorian]

One step closer to fast OS switching.... I hope.We can only hope, again.

[ziggyonice]

I really hope they add full read/write support for NTFS on the mac too.

Man, this would be really nice... Working for a computer help desk, nothing is more annoying than copying stuff off a Windows drive only to not being able to put it back on.

[twoodcc]

now this is big. will come in handy big time. can't wait for snow leopard!

[birch25]

This will be amazing! I've been using MacDrive but it's flaky and doesn't work with Windows 7. This would be great!

[arkmannj]

I assume that the new version of Boot Camp would allow installations of Windows 7 or Vista?
For me personally, I would only need to see the Mac HD and be able to copy data files from it only. No programs. That sounds really good to me.

Rich :cool:

I just thought of something. It would be a bit cumbersome, but if they gave windows Read Only access to HFS+, and with OS X already having Read-Only Access to NTFS you could essentially work on both sides just fine without anything spilling into either partition from the other O.S.

You'd end up with copies of files you use on both getting duplicated since you'd be saving each to it's own partition but it would still 'work'

As a side note, I must be outta the loop, I walked past a 32GB flash drive last night (at Costco) for about $25.00 I really think that is a fantastic option for keeping files accessible in both systems. Also, if you have an Airport Extreme/Time Capsule at home you can access files from both systems on there.

[patrickdunn]

I am pumped that I will be able to access my iTunes files while on windows. Hell yes :apple:, hell yes.

[Scott6666]

Now how about fixing the multi touch trackpad drivers so that it doesn't keep blue screening and crashing out web browsers on a site using Flash. :(

Tap-to-click PLEASE as well.

Until they add that I'm using Parallels.

[How hard can this be!!!!! :mad:]

[Schizoid]

On the subject of Snow Leopard...

Got some new temporary licences today for certain bits of Mac software.
The Licence key says "Expires August 2009" when you run the application, the licence key is valid until September 2nd 2009...

Maybe I'm reading too much into this, but Tuesday September 1st for Snow Leopard anyone?!

;)

[ziggyonice]

NTFS r/w support in Mac OS X can be downloaded for free here.
http://macntfs-3g.blogspot.com/

Does anyone have any experience using this? If it works, this would be incredibly helpful. (Trying it now...)

[Bakey]

Does anyone have any experience using this? If it works, this would be incredibly helpful. (Trying it now...)

If you're worried then give this one a shot NTFS for Mac OS X (http://www.paragon-software.com/home/ntfs-mac/) - fair enough it's $40.00 (£26.00) but it works with no problems... Well for me at least!

And they (Paragon) now include a separate installer for Windows machines to read/write Mac drives... Which is nice! :D

[jmadlena]

...Plus, even though Macs might not be able to run Windows viruses, Macs can still pass them on to other computers via e-mail or whatever. Some people seem to forget that. Just my 2¢

You mean in the case that a Mac user emails the virus to one of their Windows using friends?

A virus can't spread itself to other systems if it can't run. A virus in a .exe file on a Mac is just a file. It won't spread.

Unless there is some weird way virus' do spread in systems they can't operate in. Correct me if I'm wrong.

[hiimamac]

Cool! Another small piece of the puzzle to make things easier.

You know how macs can now run windows, what would happen if microsoft went out if their way to create an os that ran apple OS X.

Just saying. What allows Apple to do this but not the other way around?

[Biolizard]

You know how macs can now run windows, what would happen if microsoft went out if their way to create an os that ran apple OS X.

Just saying. What allows Apple to do this but not the other way around?

The OS X license agreement. Only 'Macs' may run OS X client, so it's not allowed to virtualise it. OS X Server doesn't have the restriction, but why would MS offer it when their product is dominant?

[inkswamp]

You know, I'm actually just fine with my Windows partition not being able to see/read/destroy my Mac partition.

[MikhailT]

They probably can only read/write to folders that have "everyone" group permissions with read/write enabled.

You can't really just go into your home folder from windows, it's locked to the specific OS X users, and that is usually where most people put their personal files in. So my guess is that you can only read/write to is the public folders and shared folders that you set up yourself. I am sure the System folders will be locked and hidden as well.

[WestonHarvey1]

I've been using PCs (IBM-compatible / DOS / Windows) for over 20 years, and I don't believe my systems have been infected more than perhaps 5 times, and not once within the past 5 years. Granted, I've *received* far, far more, typically through email attachments, but that's what "internet security" and "anti-virus" software is for. If you're not running that, then you have *no* reason to complain. Get Kaspersky Anti-Virus or one of the other quality anti-virus products on the market.

Thanks for reminding me why I switched :)

[magamo]

Cool. This will make my life easier. I just hope no one creates viruses taking advantage of this.

[celtikmind]

Some of you are just hysterical. Here are some handy tips for those of you who are upset that Apple just saved the rest of us some serious aggravation and increased our productivity at the expense of your virgin Mac experience;

1) Install antivirus and spyware protection on your Bootcamp Windows install. You should be doing this anyway. I shouldn't need to have to tell you this.
2) Just don't bother installing the HFS+ driver.
3) Just remove your Bootcamp partition as you're clearly not doing anything useful with it.

All I'm saying is that in years of running these supposedly "unsafe" environments, I have never had an issue. And obviously I have gotten patches and updates, arguing over a static machine is not what we are doing here :rolleyes:. OSX ain't infallible either. Are you saying that Apple releasing updates and patches from time to time also means that OSX is unsafe?

Patches or no, I am saying that Windows is, in my experience, not the plague that many holier-than-though fanboys on here make it out to be. Please, give me the option of full read/write. If you are scared of Windows getting it's "dirty hands" on you OSX drive, than turn it off.

Thank you for putting some sense in to this thread. Fanboys making stuff up only serves to put fear and panic into other people.

Perhaps Apple could implement read-only support for "holier-than-though" fanboys as well? Now that would be a good feature, wouldn't it?! Please make it internet-enabled as well. ;)

Common sense FTW!

[mikes63737]

One question I have is how will it behave with permissions? Does this mean that a user can use Windows to access another users' files?

As long as it observes permissions, it's read-only and you can disable it, I don't see a problem with this.

[deconstruct60]

The OS X license agreement. Only 'Macs' may run OS X client, so it's not allowed to virtualise it. OS X Server doesn't have the restriction, but why would MS offer it when their product is dominant?

You could ask the question way they certify Linux , Solaris , and anyone else who wants to submit to the their certification program (http://www.windowsservercatalog.com/svvp.aspx) . There is a whole new race as to whose hypervisor sits on the bottom ( VMWare , Xen (or derivation there of) , Hyper-V ). Whose ever hypervisor sits on the bottom gets to sell VM management software ( with deeper hooks.) The generic capabilitiy hypervisors are all going to be practically free.

As long as they are going to be in the business of providing a virtual machine. That machine should support a variety of OS ... otherwise it probably sucks in some way. ( things like supporting linux on Hyper-V and Bootcamp on Apple hardware open more doors than it closes. )



There is no disadvantage to Micosoft if they sell more stuff.

For Apple. If you have to buy $400+ version of the OS to run on a VM... just more money in their pockets. The catch is that none of the hypervisors run without kludges. VMWare Fusion works though (makes it transparent that it is running on apple labeled hardware since it is an OS X app.)

[soup4you2]

Some of you are just hysterical. Here are some handy tips for those of you who are upset that Apple just saved the rest of us some serious aggravation and increased our productivity at the expense of your virgin Mac experience;

1) Install antivirus and spyware protection on your Bootcamp Windows install. You should be doing this anyway. I shouldn't need to have to tell you this.
2) Just don't bother installing the HFS+ driver.
3) Just remove your Bootcamp partition as you're clearly not doing anything useful with it.
4) Keep the Windows OS patched and up-to-date.

Just keep in mine that:

1) No antivirus is 100% effective.
4) A fully patched windows OS DOES NOT mean you are not vulnerable. Windows has many, many outstanding issues they have not patched. There are also numerous issues that have either not been released to m$ for patching or just undiscovered yet.

All those do offer some sense of protection. but nothing is 100% safe.

[iJawn108]

How about some full ZFS support in snow leopard, infact... how about native ZFS in leopard.

[Jethryn Freyman]

Nice, now our Mac files can be snooped and erased in Windows. :rolleyes:

[MikhailT]

How about some full ZFS support in snow leopard, infact... how about native ZFS in leopard.

What is so important about having it in client version of SL? Majority of the users are not going to need it. Servers, I understand, not client right now.

Who knows, Apple could very well have a brand new ZFS or next gen HFS based file system that has been in development for the past several years that we know absolutely nothing about and it could be released within the next several years but not this year for sure.

[iJawn108]

You're right I don't know if they have some amazing new file system but for now, ZFS would be wicked.

[NoSmokingBandit]

After reading a few posts here it seems that nobody knows what ntfs-3g is.
You can read/write to ntfs drives from osx with this.

The hfs drivers on windows will be great though, especially if they are x64 compatible seeing as MacDrive has yet to work for x64.

[Bregalad]

I'm not worried about a Windows virus propagating to my Mac. I'm worried that a Windows virus will have write access to my Mac meaning it could do destructive things like delete /users or install a Mac worm.

[Jethryn Freyman]

I'm not worried about a Windows virus propagating to my Mac. I'm worried that a Windows virus will have write access to my Mac meaning it could do destructive things like delete /users or install a Mac worm.

Yeah, that's the threat.

[deconstruct60]

will this work with mac os x software RAID volumes?

If you bootcamp into Windows, then Mac OS X isn't running. If a Mac OS X program was providing the RAID access it isn't running either.

The partitions that are part of the RAID set up aren't really HFS+ ones. (not sure what kind of label gets placed on them because really not any of the normal ones.)

[applecultvictim]

Yawn .... Zfs apple please!!!

[deconstruct60]

What is so important about having it in client version of SL? Majority of the users are not going to need it. Servers, I understand, not client right now.


If they put sofware RAID into all of the client editions why not ZFS?
Software RAID is a subset of what ZFS does and is better at it in several aspects. ZFS also has features that enhance data integrity? Why is that a server only thing? Data on clients is less valuable?

Certainly, the logical volume management stuff isn't really going to come into play on a MacBook Air with a single disk drive. However, a mini, iMac , and/or Mac Pro with 2-3 drives attached can easily leverage that if someone is doing direct attached storage of large volume of data. If it very large files and only that machine is going to crunch the data then pushing it to a Mac Server and bring it back AFS/NFS/Samba/whatever is going to be substantively slower.

If want to bootcamp into windows and still get to it... that would be a problem. I doubt there is a "driver install" for ZFS into Windows. It doesn't "plug in" that way.

[Dagless]

Oh now this is good news! Guess I'll be waving goodbye to MacDrive.

my VMware Fusion PC already does this....

VMWare Fusion > Bootcamp

Except it's not. Bootcamp is the fastest method of running Windows on a Mac.

[NoSmokingBandit]

I wonder how long it will takes the driver package to hit a torrent site...

[MadeTheSwitch]

So far the feature list of Snow Leopard hasn't wowed me a whole lot, so for me, this is a really good addition and could potentially make my life a lot easier.

[allbrokeup]

God, I hope they add Windows 7 support to the table. I can then "deactivate" my Windows Vista License (Which I activated on my Mac) and then use it on the PC I am building :D And if 7 is enabled on Boot Camp (openly, like in the install confirmation screen "You need a bona-fide Windows XP, Vista, 7 32-Bit/64-Bit Install DVD....." I can keep windows on my Mac and run GTAIV on that too like my PC (which btw, WILL BE RUNNING OSX. I dont care HOW i do it, im gonna MAKE it :D)

Thanks,


P.S. If that seems a little rushed/confusing I just ingested a Rockstar drink :D

[aquaibm]

Nice.That's a subtle improvement but a great one.But how about the legendary 'ZFS"?
I am really eager to have a taste of that.Does this mean "ZFS" won't show up in Snow Leopard?

[illegallydead]

I wonder how long it will takes the driver package to hit a torrent site...

Haha then I wonder how long before Apple's lawyers are knocking down doors... Apple's pre-releases are much better guarded, me thinks, and I imagine they have ways of tracking whose disk made it onto the site and sue their @$$ into the ground. Even screenshots of the new stacks drill down / roll up features apparently were a violation of the NDA and were removed...

Sorry to get all serious on what was probably a light-hearted comment. And don't get me wrong, I would kill to get those drivers right now in the absence of Macdrive on my Win7 install (bastards :mad:)

[MikhailT]

If they put sofware RAID into all of the client editions why not ZFS?
Software RAID is a subset of what ZFS does and is better at it in several aspects. ZFS also has features that enhance data integrity? Why is that a server only thing? Data on clients is less valuable?

Certainly, the logical volume management stuff isn't really going to come into play on a MacBook Air with a single disk drive. However, a mini, iMac , and/or Mac Pro with 2-3 drives attached can easily leverage that if someone is doing direct attached storage of large volume of data. If it very large files and only that machine is going to crunch the data then pushing it to a Mac Server and bring it back AFS/NFS/Samba/whatever is going to be substantively slower.

If want to bootcamp into windows and still get to it... that would be a problem. I doubt there is a "driver install" for ZFS into Windows. It doesn't "plug in" that way.

Data is data. Servers deal with huge amount of data and often have multiple drives in RAID0/1 and that's why ZFS will be ported to the Server first because that's where its needed right now and we can get a lot of testing done over there.

ZFS is awesome, I agree. But as I said, majority of users (typical mac user) do not need ZFS right now, they are perfectly fine with HFS+ and FAT32/NTFS external drives but they are not going to risk it right now with new ZFS file system support if it hasn't been tested fully yet. ( I am assuming you are talking about using ZFS on storage drives and not booting drive).

Software RAID has been tested for years and is stable and that's why its there. ZFS is a brand new port for OS X.Yes It has been tested in Solaris for years but we're talking about ZFS support inside OS X, they are not the same thing.

And why would you use Software RAID on external drives? that doesn't make sense to me nor does it make sense for majority of mac users to do.

Using ZFS as the default root file system for OS X is a completely different story and I don't see that happening for another few years. It is a huge undertaking project and could be more complicated than switching from PPC to Intel.

[MikhailT]

Nice.That's a subtle improvement but a great one.But how about the legendary 'ZFS"?
I am really eager to have a taste of that.Does this mean "ZFS" won't show up in Snow Leopard?

ZFS should be supported in the server version of SL but are not expected for the client version. It may just show up in 10.6.1 update if Apple feels ZFS support is very stable.

[jb510]

Unfortunately whomever wrote this left out all the important bits. Like, will there be write access? will this drivers be available without bootcamp (ie. on an actual windows machine)?

It's amusing to see all this screaming for peoples new favorite format: Ext4, ZFS, UFS, etc... which I'm confident all but a very few have ever actually used. Most people in this thread clearly don't have a clue what they are talking about. Yes, ZFS is cool but using it on your 320GB boot drive inside your MacBook is probably a really dumb idea. All file systems have trade offs between reliability, scalability and speed... NO reliability doesn't always win, we often gladly trade it for speed.

Finally, so much progress has been made in the last couple years on the FUSE front that file systems are finally becoming less cumbersome to move between. Note I don't just mean MacFUSE and NTFS-3G, there is a lot more FUSE work going on than just that.

[grue]

Honestly I don't see myself using this feature much, but what I'd really really like would be for Boot Camp to stop using the ****ing Legacy ATA mode on my Mac Pro, and enable AHCI like it should.

[Frits]

A quick question: Can you extract from a read only HFS partition? Yes, I'm a n00b ;)

[Pika]

I found something interesting on Apple's website that could potentially be a lead to when 10.5.7 will come out.

When browsing through the store, I came across advertising for The Sims 3 pre-orders.

http://store.apple.com/us (Below the MacBooks)

It says that The Sims 3 will come out June 2nd. Looking at the specs for the game, it says that it will require OS X 10.5.7.

http://store.apple.com/us/product/TV928?mco=NzI2NDc0

Could this mean that the very latest we can expect 10.5.7 to come out will be June 2nd? I don't know how likely this would be, but if the update keeps getting delayed from the rumored dates, I think that this could show at least the last possible day.

[heffeque]

A windows virus isn't going to do anything to Mac OS X, its meant for a totally different kernel

But while in Windows, a virus CAN erase files in any read/write drive. *D'uuuuh*

[dmbfan41]

" MacRumors has learned that Apple's Boot Camp utility under Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard will include Windows HFS+ drivers, which will allow Windows installations to read Mac OS X HFS+ formatted partitions. "

On that note I'm going to wait for snow leopard before I even bother installing windows 7.

so much for macdrive.

[baconabuse]

Apple's pre-releases are much better guarded

Nope.

Honestly I don't see myself using this feature much, but what I'd really really like would be for Boot Camp to stop using the ****ing Legacy ATA mode on my Mac Pro, and enable AHCI like it should.

You're in luck!

http://www.insanelymac.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=126089

I've used both the shell script (Windows 7 64-bit) and GRUB (Windows Vista 64-bit & Ubuntu 8.10 & 9.04) with success on my early 2008 Mac Pro octocore. This enables the two extra SATA ports as well. All I did was follow the given instructions so if you've got questions ask over there :)

It's really easy. So easy even Apple could do it as a fix for AHCI via Apple Update. HINT HINT (make with the fan fix too, jerks)

[NoSmokingBandit]

Haha then I wonder how long before Apple's lawyers are knocking down doors... Apple's pre-releases are much better guarded, me thinks, and I imagine they have ways of tracking whose disk made it onto the site and sue their @$$ into the ground. Even screenshots of the new stacks drill down / roll up features apparently were a violation of the NDA and were removed...

Sorry to get all serious on what was probably a light-hearted comment. And don't get me wrong, I would kill to get those drivers right now in the absence of Macdrive on my Win7 install (bastards :mad:)

The Snow Leo dev copies have been on TPB for a while. Apple really cant do anything to stop it, no matter who hard they try. Heck, some guys have already installed 10.6 on their hackintosh.
Im just hoping somone takes the driver pack and makes a separate torrent for it so its not a 6gb download just to get the hfs drivers.
Not that i download torrents or anything...
:cool:

[cgc]

I have MacDrive installed then uninstalled it as it allowed Windows users (or malware) to exfiltrate data from my Mac...I see this as something Apple needs to allow us to selectively install or not. Or force authentication prior to connecting to certain folders or drives...or make filevault better.

[MikhailT]

Unfortunately whomever wrote this left out all the important bits. Like, will there be write access? will this drivers be available without bootcamp (ie. on an actual windows machine)?

It's amusing to see all this screaming for peoples new favorite format: Ext4, ZFS, UFS, etc... which I'm confident all but a very few have ever actually used. Most people in this thread clearly don't have a clue what they are talking about. Yes, ZFS is cool but using it on your 320GB boot drive inside your MacBook is probably a really dumb idea. All file systems have trade offs between reliability, scalability and speed... NO reliability doesn't always win, we often gladly trade it for speed.

Finally, so much progress has been made in the last couple years on the FUSE front that file systems are finally becoming less cumbersome to move between. Note I don't just mean MacFUSE and NTFS-3G, there is a lot more FUSE work going on than just that.

Nobody is screaming for any file systems, they are specifically talking about ZFS which has been touted to be added as one of the file systems that Apple will support. That's why they are talking about when will it show up. Read-only ZFS did show up in Leopard for a whlie. ZFS makes sense on SANs, direct connected storage units like Multibay External drives via eSATA|Firewire 800.

However, I agree with the fact ZFS is still not needed on the client side for a while. Let ZFS continues to improve over time as the features continues to get added, performance gains, maturity always help and so on.

[MikeTheC]

Nice, Apple.

The next thing on the list is to be able to write to NTFS-formatted drives. But I suppose Microsoft needs to have a hand in that. *sigh*

Um, we already have that. Check out this site. (http://macntfs-3g.blogspot.com/)

[Luis Ortega]

MacRumors has learned that Apple's Boot Camp utility under Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard will include Windows HFS+ drivers, which will allow Windows installations to read Mac OS X HFS+ formatted partitions.
If you upgrade to snow leopard will you need to reinstall the windows setup as well or will it still work with the new version of bootcamp?

[grue]

You're in luck!

http://www.insanelymac.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=126089

I've used both the shell script (Windows 7 64-bit) and GRUB (Windows Vista 64-bit & Ubuntu 8.10 & 9.04) with success on my early 2008 Mac Pro octocore. This enables the two extra SATA ports as well. All I did was follow the given instructions so if you've got questions ask over there :)

It's really easy. So easy even Apple could do it as a fix for AHCI via Apple Update. HINT HINT (make with the fan fix too, jerks)

Oh, it can be done, and I have done it, I really just loathe the fact that I have to do it in the first place.

[Dagless]

Well I've been using MacDrive ever since 2006 and I've never had a virus on XP (the most used OS on my iMac too), therefore my OSX drive has been safe too.

[morphineseason]

I wonder if Apple will freely distribute these drivers so that you can install them on just regular ol' Windows machines (not boot camp partitions). I wouldn't mind being able to use my external freely across both platforms without having to partition the drive.

[robd003]

I'd actually really hope that you get a choice of read-only or read-write drivers. How nasty would it be if Windows viruses screwed up your OS X install too? (i.e. install botnet software on both OS's)

Let's hope Apple gives us some security against Windows problems affecting OS X.

Awesome!! i hope it is full read/write support. I really hope they add full read/write support for NTFS on the mac too.

[DoFoT9]

I'd actually really hope that you get a choice of read-only or read-write drivers. How nasty would it be if Windows viruses screwed up your OS X install too? (i.e. install botnet software on both OS's)

Let's hope Apple gives us some security against Windows problems affecting OS X.

i doubt that a common virus would completely explode your mac partition.. probably wouldnt even do anything do it - but still the chances are there i guess, i hope this is read only support.

[r.j.s]

i doubt that a common virus would completely explode your mac partition.. probably wouldnt even do anything do it - but still the chances are there i guess, i hope this is read only support.

If it had write access, a virus that corrupts or deletes files *could* potentially affect some Mac files.

I'm pretty sure they will come up with some protection.

[DoFoT9]

If it had write access, a virus that corrupts or deletes files *could* potentially affect some Mac files.

I'm pretty sure they will come up with some protection.

yea true it could, all depends on the virus. personally i dont care because i dont use bootcamp anymore, as for bootcamparians -- they would hope that apple implements some sort of permission type thing. maybe a pop up of some sort requesting access? (goes with the windows theme haha).

[enjourni]

"OMG I'm going to get viruses!!!"

BS. No offense you guys (I love macs too) but this is just a bunch of misinformation.

NO, you won't get viruses... IF you know what you're doing.

(A) If you don't like Boot Camp just buy Parallels or VMWare and be done with it. Both those options let you limit what access windows has to your mac.

(B) For all the junk and misinformation out there, it's actually pathetically easy to keep viruses off a PC:

- Install Firefox and Adblock Plus. Never use IE... EVER.
- Keep your system patched with MS update (the only use for IE)
- Install Antivir, Spybot S&D, Spyware Blaster and keep them up to date
- No P2P software, no torrents (unless they are trusted ie from Pirate Bay)
- No software/gaming cracks unless they already come in a trusted torrent
- If you're really paranoid, run your windows apps in Sandboxie

Problem solved. Where most people screw up is they run IE and don't keep their system patched. If you're running IE, you're basically asking for someone to crash your system.

[MikeTheC]

"OMG I'm going to get viruses!!!"

LOL! Yeah, I love that, too. :)

(B) For all the junk and misinformation out there, it's actually pathetically easy to keep viruses off a PC:

- Install Firefox and Adblock Plus. Never use IE... EVER.
- Keep your system patched with MS update (the only use for IE)
- Install Antivir, Spybot S&D, Spyware Blaster and keep them up to date
- No P2P software, no torrents (unless they are trusted ie from Pirate Bay)
- No software/gaming cracks unless they already come in a trusted torrent
- If you're really paranoid, run your windows apps in Sandboxie

Problem solved. Where most people screw up is they run IE and don't keep their system patched. If you're running IE, you're basically asking for someone to crash your system.
I can't help but that this reinforces my belief that not everyone should own a computer. Not everyone is meant to. (Of course, I also believe that such things as children and cars/drivers' licenses are privileges not everyone is entitled to, either.)

[zorinlynx]

People,

Filesystem driver or not, if your Windows install gets a virus while in Boot Camp, your Mac data isn't safe at all.

The virus could easily randomly corrupt blocks all over the disk, destroying your data even if it can't mount the actual partition.

If you want to truly be safe against Windows viruses, run a VM and don't grant the VM access to mount your OS X partition. And even then, the inconvenience of not being able to access your Mac data makes it not all that worth it.

Just use safe practices when you use Windows on the net. It's that simple.

[lamadude]

- No P2P software, no torrents (unless they are trusted ie from Pirate Bay)


There are plenty of viruses on pirate bay torrents

[MikeTheC]

There are plenty of viruses on pirate bay torrents
The only torrents I would expect to be virus-free are ones from authoritative sources of the material itself, e.g. various Linux distro ISOs.

[AidenShaw]

The only torrents I would expect to be virus-free are ones from authoritative sources of the material itself, e.g. various Linux distro ISOs.

Although, it's the nature of a torrent that you get the data from a peer - not from the source.

Are there signatures and checksums so that a malevolent peer couldn't send malware with a "trusted" torrent?

[MikeTheC]

Although, it's the nature of a torrent that you get the data from a peer - not from the source.

Are there signatures and checksums so that a malevolent peer couldn't send malware with a "trusted" torrent?
As far as I know, Aiden, BitTorrent incorporates checksums, etc. to ensure a given BT transfer won't get compromised by a malicious individual. Whether they use something like SHA1 or whatever, I really don't know. It's supposed to be secure, and I'm guessing the BT protocol is well-known enough in F/OSS circles that issues of that nature would be known and dealt with.

But otherwise yes, you're right: what you get (or don't get) via BT is based on what you decide to download.

In the main, I don't use filesharing stuff all that much any more, since (for various reasons) my "daily driver" is Ubuntu, and software acquisition for it is pretty much by definition clear of compromising copyright issues. Other than for watching or listening to streaming content, the overwhelming majority of data I/O for me comes in the form of software updates from authenticated repos, which pretty much eliminates the security issues as well.

[MikhailT]

Checksum or hashes don't do anything to prevent the file to get infected. If the file was infected first and then the person hashed it and upload it, it'll be the same infected file at the end with the same hash. It's all about the source. The best way to know which torrents are good on tpb is to know the uploader personally. If he has a well known history, then there's a high chance it is not infected.

[MikeTheC]

Checksum or hashes don't do anything to prevent the file to get infected. If the file was infected first and then the person hashed it and upload it, it'll be the same infected file at the end with the same hash. It's all about the source. The best way to know which torrents are good on tpb is to know the uploader personally. If he has a well known history, then there's a high chance it is not infected.
No, Mikhail, what I think Aiden was referring to -- and absolutely what I was referring to -- was compromise after it was hashed and made available, not before. Obviously, if it were compromised before, then you'd be 100% correct.

[AidenShaw]

Checksum or hashes don't do anything to prevent the file to get infected. If the file was infected first and then the person hashed it and upload it, it'll be the same infected file at the end with the same hash. It's all about the source. The best way to know which torrents are good on tpb is to know the uploader personally. If he has a well known history, then there's a high chance it is not infected.

You don't "download a file from someone" with BitTorrent.

You download pieces of it in parallel from various peer sites. "Someone" can't substitute a complete file with an infected one by changing bits on a single computer.

To substitute an infected download, you have to subvert the directory information - so that someone requests all of the pieces of the infected file rather than the original.

Which is clearly possible, as proven by the OSX "Iwork" botnet that is now running.

The "signature" that I was referring to would be an MD5/SHA1/SHA256 or whatever from the trusted torrent master - so that after the download, when all the pieces were reassembled, you could verify to a very, very high degree of certainty that your copy is bit-for-bit identical to the trusted master.

I'm worried about the case where a "trusted" torrent master in fact serves you an infected file.

Actually, I'm not "worried" - I've never installed a torrent client and don't download stuff from the torrents. (While there are a few legitimate torrent sites, most are pirates and thieves. I don't go there.)

[MikhailT]

You don't "download a file from someone" with BitTorrent.

You download pieces of it in parallel from various peer sites. "Someone" can't substitute a complete file with an infected one by changing bits on a single computer.

To substitute an infected download, you have to subvert the directory information - so that someone requests all of the pieces of the infected file rather than the original.

Which is clearly possible, as proven by the OSX "Iwork" botnet that is now running.

The "signature" that I was referring to would be an MD5/SHA1/SHA256 or whatever from the trusted torrent master - so that after the download, when all the pieces were reassembled, you could verify to a very, very high degree of certainty that your copy is bit-for-bit identical to the trusted master.

I know how bittorrent works. I never said anything about peers. I was talking about the source. The iWork torrent was infected by the source, not by what you just described.

The bittorent client who created the torrent file will provide a list of pieces and its SHA1 hashes. It's all in the torrent file. If somebody wants to infect it, they have to gain access to the tracker and replace the torrent file.

[Ludacrisvp]

NTFS support would require a Microsoft license, so that's probably not going to happen.
The Snow Leopard I use has native Read and WRITE to NTFS partitions.
So it has already happened.

[MikhailT]

The Snow Leopard I use has native Read and WRITE to NTFS partitions.
So it has already happened.

To internal drives or to external drives? External drives is nothing.

[Ludacrisvp]

To internal drives or to external drives? External drives is nothing.

Both for me work just fine.

I posted more info here
Insanely Mac (http://www.insanelymac.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=148271)

So they had it in build 10a190 for sure, not sure about any other ones though.

[NoSmokingBandit]

NTFS read/write doesnt need any permission from MS as long as its built from the ground up. NTFS-3G has been around for ages, i was wondering when apple would introduce something like that.

[Ti_Poussin]

My only concern is not the virus that can spread into the mac drive, come on people, what would your mac do with a fake dll or a .exe dameon?

The real problem is the Unix permission being ignored on Windows, not sure it's going to be that safe?! log under Windows and access all root owned file?
That's my scary part into this. I guess I will move everything in my home and encrypt it. But still, Windows will be able to delete this...

Please, tell me they have updated bootcamp to sync user and keep the files permission! ok it's totally impossible without a major update to Windows.

But it's a good thing, maybe the iPod formated under Windows will be HFS+ from now on ;-)

[MikhailT]

Both for me work just fine.

I posted more info here
Insanely Mac (http://www.insanelymac.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=148271)

So they had it in build 10a190 for sure, not sure about any other ones though.

Thanks. So NTFS in OSX and HFS in Windows and not to mention Exchange built in in Snow leopard. This release is starting to look like MS just bought out Apple. (joke seriously its a joke)

[MikhailT]

My only concern is not the virus that can spread into the mac drive, come on people, what would your mac do with a fake dll or a .exe dameon?

The real problem is the Unix permission being ignored on Windows, not sure it's going to be that safe?! log under Windows and access all root owned file?
That's my scary part into this. I guess I will move everything in my home and encrypt it. But still, Windows will be able to delete this...

Please, tell me they have updated bootcamp to sync user and keep the files permission! ok it's totally impossible without a major update to Windows.

But it's a good thing, maybe the iPod formated under Windows will be HFS+ from now on ;-)

I bet we'll find out at WWDC.

There's no root enabled by default in OSX, so we'll see what kind of stuff that can happen with the folders outside the home directory.

[Unseelie23]

Ya, this seems like a very easy way to have mac files become infected with virii. Sure, they wont do anything on the mac side, but if you want to transfer your files to a PC user...

How do you figure? It says "Read", not "Read/Write".

[chowmein]

Many people are forgetting that viruses can simply erase all partitions rather than corrupt data. That to me poses a much bigger threat than data corruption. Read-only drivers please!

[MikhailT]

Many people are forgetting that viruses can simply erase all partitions rather than corrupt data. That to me poses a much bigger threat than data corruption. Read-only drivers please!

Read-only drivers won't protect you from having its partition deleted, it can do that without even having any kind of drivers in the first place.

Viruses are very slowly dying out to torjans. The authors are now trying to make it into a business to make money by blackmailing or by controlling the computers as a botnet.

[Terpander]

Does this mean that Macs will become more vulnerable to internet viruses? If I understand correctly the fact that malicious programs which were downloaded while we surfed and were not able to execute themselves due to compatibility issues will be able to do so now as easily as on a PC. I for one, if right, am not looking forward to Nortons and Macafees and their constant upgrades. Can anyone elucidate? (I admit I only read the article and not the almost 200 responses)

[DoFoT9]

Does this mean that Macs will become more vulnerable to internet viruses? If I understand correctly the fact that malicious programs which were downloaded while we surfed and were not able to execute themselves due to compatibility issues will be able to do so now as easily as on a PC. I for one, if right, am not looking forward to Nortons and Macafees and their constant upgrades. Can anyone elucidate? (I admit I only read the article and not the almost 200 responses)

unless the virus is a well written one that can maliciously attack any part of the hard drive it has (and get permission to do that), no - you will be safe from a good >95% of viruses (on the mac side of things anyway).

[dhowden]

Nice one Appl! I'm looking forward to 10.6 :D

[MacManiac76]

Don't really use Boot Camp, but this sounds like a nice feature. Would be able to access the media files on an HFS+ partition while in Windows.

[Sambo110]

How will we install the new boot camp? Will we have to uninstall Windows and reinstall it?

[r.j.s]

How will we install the new boot camp? Will we have to uninstall Windows and reinstall it?

It is usually an update that you install in Windows.

[DoFoT9]

It is usually an update that you install in Windows.

more in-depthly: you download an iso/disc image file, burn that to a disc, and then run that in Windows and it does it all for you (over rides the previous drivers of course).

[tweeg]

btw, i currently have Leopard with Xp on a fat partition via bootcamp.

if i upgrade to Snow Leopard will my Xp partition stay intact ?

[pr5owner]

read-only would be nice, otherwise there is the risk of virii getting to the Mac files

you mac users really surf that many questionable/porn sites that your scared of viruses?

heres an idea, stop being an idiot when it comes to the internet.

[CQd44]

you mac users really surf that many questionable/porn sites that your scared of viruses?

heres an idea, stop being an idiot when it comes to the internet.

There are some people I recommend macs to simply because they're a lot more user-proof than windows machines are.

[DoFoT9]

you mac users really surf that many questionable/porn sites that your scared of viruses?

heres an idea, stop being an idiot when it comes to the internet.
Of course we do ;). But seriously, i think the problem is that most switchers are not educated enough with the whole virus thing, they think macs virusi are just as common as pc based ones - whci hwe all know is entirely false.

We all know the reasons why any computer gets a virus - people doing stupid things whether it be emails, porn or whatever. It's not because of any other reason (unless you are unlucky and get hit by a pretty mean virus).

Why is there reason i should be scared of a virus on my mac? There are none! I go to many questionable websites, have my firewall off and everything. Im fine after 5 years! My pc doesnt even have antivirus nor firewall. You just have to play it smart.

[AaronX]

I'm wondering how this is implemented? I upgraded to SL but when I booted into Win I couldn't find my Mac drive. What do I have to do?

[allbrokeup]

Install the Windows Boot Camp Drivers from the Snow Leopard Disc.