diff --git a/libblkid/wholedisk.c b/libblkid/wholedisk.c
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..1dbb90c
--- /dev/null
+++ b/libblkid/wholedisk.c
@@ -0,0 +1,62 @@
+/*
+ * No copyright is claimed.  This code is in the public domain; do with
+ * it what you wish.
+ *
+ * Written by Karel Zak <kzak@redhat.com>
+ */
+#include <stdio.h>
+#include <stdlib.h>
+#include <ctype.h>
+
+#include "blkdev.h"
+#include "wholedisk.h"
+
+int is_whole_disk_fd(int fd, const char *name)
+{
+#ifdef HDIO_GETGEO
+	if (fd != -1) {
+		struct hd_geometry geometry;
+		int i = ioctl(fd, HDIO_GETGEO, &geometry);
+		if (i == 0)
+			return geometry.start == 0;
+	}
+#endif
+	/*
+	 * The "silly heuristic" is still sexy for us, because
+	 * for example Xen doesn't implement HDIO_GETGEO for virtual
+	 * block devices (/dev/xvda).
+	 *
+	 * -- kzak@redhat.com (23-Feb-2006)
+	 */
+	while (*name)
+		name++;
+	return !isdigit(name[-1]);
+}
+
+int is_whole_disk(const char *name)
+{
+	int fd = -1, res = 0;
+#ifdef HDIO_GETGEO
+	fd = open(name, O_RDONLY);
+	if (fd != -1)
+#endif
+		res = is_whole_disk_fd(fd, name);
+
+	if (fd != -1)
+		close(fd);
+	return res;
+}
+
+#ifdef TEST_PROGRAM
+int main(int argc, char **argv)
+{
+	if (argc < 2) {
+		fprintf(stderr, "usage: %s <device>\n", argv[0]);
+		exit(EXIT_FAILURE);
+	}
+
+	printf("%s: is%s whole disk\n", argv[1],
+			is_whole_disk(argv[1]) ? "" : " NOT");
+	exit(EXIT_SUCCESS);
+}
+#endif