Re: Is it true that `dd` is almost not needed?

> On Dec 11, 2021, at 11:22 AM, Brian Brombacher <brian@planetunix.net> wrote:
>
> 
>> On Dec 11, 2021, at 11:12 AM, uxer@mailo.com wrote:
>>
>> The article:
>> https://eklitzke.org/the-cult-of-dd
>>
>> The content of the article:
>>
>> The Cult of DD
>> Mar 17, 2017
>> You'll often see instructions for creating and using disk images on Unix
>> systems making use of the dd command. This is a strange program of
>> [obscure provenance](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dd_(Unix)) that
>> somehow, still manages to survive in the 21st century.
>>
>> Actually, using dd is almost never necessary, and due to its highly
>> nonstandard syntax is usually just an easy way to mess things up. For
>> instance, you'll see instructions like this asking you to run commands
>> like:
>>
>> # Obscure dd version
>> dd if=image.iso of=/dev/sdb bs=4M
>> Guess what? This is exactly equivalent to a regular shell pipeline using
>> cat and shell redirection:
>>
>> # Equivalent cat version
>> cat image.iso >/dev/sdb
>> That weird bs=4M argument in the dd version isn't actually doing
>> anything special---all it's doing is instructing the dd command to use a
>> 4 MB buffer size while copying. But who cares? Why not just let the
>> command figure out the right buffer size automatically?
>>
>> Another reason to prefer the cat variant is that it lets you actually
>> string together a normal shell pipeline. For instance, if you want
>> progress information with cat you can combine it with the pv command:
>>
>> # Cat version with progress meter
>> cat image.iso | pv >/dev/sdb
>> There's an obscure option to GNU dd to get it to display a progress
>> meter as well. But why bother memorizing that? If you learn the pv trick
>> once, you can use it with any program.
>>
>> If you want to create a file of a certain size, you can do so using
>> other standard programs like head. For instance, here are two ways to
>> create a 100 MB file containing all zeroes:
>>
>> # Obscure dd version
>> dd if=/dev/zero of=image.iso bs=4MB count=25
>>
>> # Regular head version
>> head -c 100MB /dev/zero >image.iso
>> The head command is useful for lots of things, not just creating disk
>> images. Therefore it's a better investment of your time to learn head
>> than it is to learn dd. In fact, you probably already know how to use it.
>>
>> I will confess: there are some interesting options that dd has, which
>> aren't easily replicated with cat or head. For instance, you can use dd
>> to convert a file between ASCII and EBCDIC encodings. So if you find
>> yourself doing that a lot, I won't blame you for reaching for dd. But
>> otherwise, try to stick to more standard Unix tools.
>>
>> ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
>> End of article and my questions:
>>
>> Is the author right in general?
>
> No.
>
>> Is the author right for Linux environment?
>
> No.
>
>> Is the author right for OpenBSD environment?
>
> No.

I'll clarify. Change No to Maybe, only for the examples provided in the article.

Otherwise, dd is useful for other actions.