genisoimage

genisoimage is a pre-mastering program to generate ISO9660/Joliet/HFS hybrid filesystems.

genisoimage is capable of generating the System Use Sharing Protocol records (SUSP) specified by the Rock Ridge Interchange Protocol. This is used to further describe the files in the ISO9660 filesystem to a Unix host, and provides information such as long filenames, UID/GID, POSIX permissions, symbolic links, and block and character device files.

If Joliet or HFS hybrid command line options are specified, genisoimage will create the additional filesystem metadata needed for Joliet or HFS. Otherwise genisoimage will generate a pure ISO9660 filesystem.

genisoimage can generate a true (or shared) HFS hybrid filesystem. The same files are seen as HFS files when accessed from a Macintosh and as ISO9660 files when accessed from other machines. HFS stands for Hierarchical File System and is the native filesystem used on Macintosh computers.

Documentation

• man 1 'genisoimage' [EN]

Syntax

genisoimage [PARAMETER ...] PATH [PATH ...]

Parameters

-b IMAGE

Specifies the path and filename of the boot IMAGE to be used when making an El Torito bootable CD for x86 PCs. The pathname must be relative to the source path specified to genisoimage. This option is required to make an El Torito bootable CD. The boot image must be exactly 1200 kB, 1440 kB or 2880 kB, and genisoimage will use this size when creating the output ISO9660 filesystem.

-c CATALOG

Specifies the path and filename of the boot CATALOG, which is required for an El Torito bootable CD. The pathname must be relative to the source path specified to genisoimage. This file will be inserted into the output tree and not created in the source filesystem, so be sure the specified filename does not conflict with an existing file, or it will be excluded. Usually a name like boot.catalog is chosen.

-dvd-video

Generate a DVD-Video compliant UDF filesystem. This is done by sorting the order of the content of the appropriate files and by adding padding between the files if needed.

NOTE:

The sorting only works if the DVD-Video filenames include uppercase characters only.

-J

Generate Joliet directory records in addition to regular ISO9660 filenames. This is primarily useful when the discs are to be used on Windows machines. Joliet filenames are specified in Unicode and each path component can be up to 64 Unicode characters long.

NOTE:

Joliet is not a standard - only Microsoft Windows and Linux systems can read Joliet extensions. For greater portability, consider using both Joliet and Rock Ridge extensions.

-o FILE

Specify the output FILE for the the ISO9660 filesystem image. This can be a disk file, a tape drive, or it can correspond directly to the device name of the optical disc writer. If not specified, stdout is used.

NOTE:

The output can also be a block device for a regular disk partition, in which case the ISO9660 filesystem can be mounted normally to verify that it was generated correctly.

-r

This is like the -R option, but file ownership and modes are set to more useful values. The uid and gid are set to zero, because they are usually only useful on the author's system, and not useful to the client. All the file read bits are set true, so that files and directories are globally readable on the client. If any execute bit is set for a file, set all of the execute bits, so that executables are globally executable on the client. If any search bit is set for a directory, set all of the search bits, so that directories are globally searchable on the client. All write bits are cleared, because the filesystem will be mounted read-only in any case. If any of the special mode bits are set, clear them, because file locks are not useful on a read-only filesystem, and set-id bits are not desirable for uid 0 or gid 0.

-R

Generate SUSP and RR records using the Rock Ridge protocol to further describe the files on the ISO9660 filesystem.

-sysid ID

Specifies the system ID. There is space for 32 characters.

-T

Generate a file TRANS.TBL in each directory on the CD-ROM, which can be used on non-Rock Ridge-capable systems to help establish the correct filenames. There is also information present in the file that indicates the major and minor numbers for block and character devices, and each symlink has the name of the link file given.

-udf

Include UDF filesystem support in the generated filesystem image. UDF support is currently in alpha status and for this reason, it is not possible to create UDF-only images. UDF data structures are currently coupled to the Joliet structures, so there are many pitfalls with the current implementation. There is no UID/GID support, there is no POSIX permission support, there is no support for symlinks.

NOTE:

UDF wastes the space from sector ~20 to sector 256 at the beginning of the disc in addition to the space needed for real UDF data structures.

Examples

Create a backup of your home directory

genisoimage -J -T -r -o '/tmp/backup.iso' "${HOME}/"