Hi all, With the following script and parted 3.2 #!/bin/bash image=blank.img dd if=/dev/zero of=$image bs=1M count=32 sync cat <<-EOF | parted -s $image mklabel msdos mkpart primary ext2 0 100% set 1 boot on EOF sync file $image I see different results if parted is invoked with -s or without. *With* -s, the call to file results in "blank.img: data" and there's no partitions in the disk image. *Without* -s, Welcome to GNU Parted! Type 'help' to view a list of commands. (parted) mklabel msdos (parted) mkpart primary ext2 0 100% Warning: The resulting partition is not properly aligned for best performance. (parted) set 1 boot on (parted) quit blank.img: DOS/MBR boot sector; partition 1 : ID=0x83, active, start-CHS (0x0,0,2), end-CHS (0x1ff,3,32), startsector 1, 65535 sectors Removing the quit command makes no difference. The script without -s will crash at least parted 2.3. Thanks, Adam Baxter